So i have two optispark distributers that are bad and i am going to make them into one "hopefuly" working one...
one has a good sensor and the other has a good cap and rotor...

i want to know if it would hurt the car to start it without the water pump... long enough to see if the car will start. because right now the car will not even start...

 

I've done it, you'll be fine..

 

You can run the car for a few seconds like that, no biggie.

 

Yup, I do it too. A cold engine should be good up to 30 seconds easily and safely. This is great advice for anyone installing the opti.

 

That's how we tested mine to figure out if we needed to pull the cap and rotor back off and do the opti body as well.

 

When I installed my past few opti's I always start it just to see if it fires up then shut it off after a few seconds. Don't want to throw it all back together just to find out it doesn't work. I never had an issue doing this. When I did it though, it didn't want to rev, I believe it was because the coolant temp sensor wasn't connected, just something to keep in mind.

 

You could always plug the sensor wiring harness into the unmounted water pump sensor to get around this issue.

 

Thats whats i did.

 

Me too.