2rz crank, no spark (solved)

Posting this to give back since I used this forum so heavily.

1995.5/1996 Tacoma 2wd with a 2rz cuts off 100yds from my house after a 50 mile drive. No codes. During restart attempts it would occasionally run for a sec. Pulled the plugs and no spark. 3 months ago I replaced the cap, rotor, plugs and wires so I know it's not that. I deep dived into every connection, ground and component in the ignition system.

The only component that's hard to definitively test is the cap and rotor. Both looked new. On a whim I reinstalled the old rotor. Fires right up.

When I replaced all these months ago I used ngk plugs and wires, Bosch cap and a $3 rotor because that's all that was in stock.

Moral of the story is cheap parts suck.

 

Caps and rotors are not all the same, the parts guy should have known to not sell you brand X cap and brand Y rotor... even a .020 air gap differernce between the 2 differnt assemblies causes issues like you just found out. I will bet your coil was overheating in an attempt to jump the combined gaps. Overcoming the air gap between the rotor and cap plus the resistor in the wires plus the air gap in the plug... and having to do this @ 2000 rpm / 60 seconds = 33.33 time a second, lots to ask of a coil.