engine cranks, but doesn't fire in cooler weather

[henge]

I've been searching up and down the interwebs to try and find something that may be the cause to this car giving me problems on mornings when the temperature is under 50 degrees.

First off. The Car is a 1988 323 Sedan with the 1.6L SOHC engine. (was automatic, but has been swapped to 5spd, in case it matters)

This started in the past week when temps fell under 50 or so at night and basically in the morning the car turns over but won't start. Come back in the afternoon and the car starts just fine. I started by jumping the test pin and I get one flash. To me it seems like a "long" flash which would indicate a code of 10 which is for the Intake air temperature sensor. I have checked the resistance of the AFM and checked for continuity to in the harness to the ECM, and both test fine. I have even tried swapping in a spare AFM and ECM both with the same results. I also took into consideration that the flash may be a short flash which would make it code 1 for ignition pulse. The connector is fine. I checked the continuity between the (-) on the coil and the (1M) terminal on the ECM and that was good too. I've also swapped in 2 different coils (including a MSD Blaster SS) and the results are the same. The distributor, distributor cap and rotor, plugs, and plug wires have also been replaced within the past 6 months and all still look good. The battery is fairly new, and reads 12.65 volts in both the cold and warm weather. I haven't had a chance to test the amps of the battery, but since the engine still turns over at the same speed as normal it doesn't immediately seem like it would be the issue.

Has anyone had a similar experience or know of where I may turn next?

Thanks in advance!

[henge]

So I tested the battery this morning. It is a 550cca battery and on the tester it read 556cca's and 12.7V. The starter and charging system all tested fine as well.

To try and determine if the issue lies with the ECM i took it out of the car, and kept it in the house last night, plugged it in this morning and the car fired right up. Now it wasn't as cold this morning as it has been the past couple of mornings, so I figured it might just be a coincidence. So this evening, I took the ECM and put it in the fridge for an hour to get its temperature down. Put it back in the car and sure enough it fires right up. So i'm at a loss...

[azgtx]

bad ground somewhere

[henge]

I think I may have found the problem. Found wiring schematics and realized the igniter is located in the distributor. I checked the resistance and it was measuring at .857 Megaohms (857,000 ohms). I had the igniter from the old distributor still, (which was working great, only replaced because the internal seals were leaking oil) and the resistance on that one measured in at .466 Kiloohms (466 ohms). So I swapped them out, and turned it over and it fired immediately. I took the suspected "bad igniter and put it in the freezer for a few minutes and measured it again and the reading was 10.23 Megaohms! (10,230,000 ohms). So hopefully this fixes it, guess i'll find out in the AM

[88SLABMAZDA]

I have same issue with mine only on cold days.

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[txmnjim]

some cars just dont like cold weather. i was having the same issue, although it would start but took a couple
tries, and was about to dive in and replace spark plugs, etc and ran into a thread that said it was normal for
their car on cold days. i waited until the cold front passed and tried it this morning when it went up to ~25 degrees
and it started on 1st attempt. i had a volvo 740 that was same way and it worked fine when i used a block heater...
and yes, i'm aware this is an old thread jim