Hah! Yeah, lots of stories about doing this and then in the heat of the moment trying to figure out how to turn it off!
Not sure if the Scouts used a ballast resistor mounted on a ceramic base (like Chrysler and others) or a resistor wire like Ford and GM did on most vehicles.
But possible failure points for not getting power to the coil might be:
1. Ignition switch. Wire should run direct from switch without stopping anywhere other than a possible resistor.
2. The wire itself, perhaps being broken where it runs through the firewall. Or at a connector. Most of the OE's tried to do without many, or any connectors on that circuit if they could avoid it. But even our Broncos had the one at the firewall, and then some years had a connector not far from the ignition switch so you could replace the resistor wire as a package if it ever failed.
3. Look closely under the hood at the wire or connectors, as that's where the "weather" is the worst.
4. If he's not had the vehicle that long, hunt around for the wire and follow it all the way to make sure there are no kill-switches installed by the PO at some point.
5. Make sure the key was in RUN/ON rather than ACC position. Ignitions and voltage regulators are typically not hot in ACC.
6. Even without a voltage signal, don't forget to check under the distributor cap and all that other stuff. He might be fighting more than one issue.
Not that our beloved old trucks would ever do that to us!%)
Good luck. Get it runnin'!
Paul
