Confusing coil wiring

Still on the ongoing saga of trying to get the cabby to start, and come up against something a bit strange :dontknow:

The coil should have a black wire on one side and a black/coloured and black wire on the other.  On mine I have 2 black wires on either side
I swapped them over and now when I try to start the car the rev needle jumps up and down a little which I think it should do.  Nothing else has blown and seems normal.  I found the timing is completely out on the dizzy so can't tell yet if swapping the wires on the coil has caused any misfiring issues!

Any help would be great!

you should have black wires to the +ve/15 side, if its points ign there will be a purple white wire as well on the + side.
-ve/1 side should have red/black and/or green wires.

if it helps most bosch coils have 3 pins on the + side, and 2 on the -ve. but actually look at the coil to see if it has any markings

Therein lies the problem!  I can see the + and - marks on the coil, but it is no help when all the wires I have are all black-no colour on them at all!

If I do get the wires round the wrong way, what will happen?

Cheers for the help rubjonny!

it wont fire, nothing else really. doesnt sound right to me has the wiring been messed with then?

Yeah it looks like a previous owner had installed new wiring for a stereo and possibly some kind of alarm system.  There are a few spliced wires around the fusebox and a green/black one on the ignition.  They seem to be holding up alright though, and the car always used to run perfectly before I stripped it down!

The only thing that happened when we tried to start it for the first time after the engine being rebuilt and reinstalled, was a fuse popped and the fuel pump relay packed in-was a fair bit of smoke too

I just don't want to blow anything else up if I get it wrong, so at the moment im bridging the relay to get it running all the time whilst trying to start the engine.

I'm assuming this has electronic ignition (it has 3 pin plug on the dizzy yes?) if so check the wires with a multimeter. the one which is live with ignition, goes to the coil +. then check the wires at the TCI unit in the scuttle, the wire from pin 4 should also go to the +ve side. pin 1 from the tci should go to the -ve side of the coil, and by a process of elimination the last wire must be the rev counter signal to the fusebox, and go to the last terminal on the -ve side

Thanks for that rubjonny!

Yes it is electronic ignition.  The car is an 87 Cabby GTi with the DX engine code.

Going to give all the suggestions a go on Sunday and hopefully get her up and running after a 2 year break

Hi mate,  Saw this whilst googling! Did you manage to get it sorted at all? I'm having a nightmare 

I need colour wiring from module tp900 to coilfor mk1 golf carb enjin

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rubjonny said

you should have black wires to the +ve/15 side, if its points ign there will be a purple white wire as well on the + side.
-ve/1 side should have red/black and/or green wires.

if it helps most bosch coils have 3 pins on the + side, and 2 on the -ve. but actually look at the coil to see if it has any markings

Have 2black wires on +side of coil and green and red with black stripe on the - side but red/black wire is my Rev counter wire but coil get very hot after a while

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