How to shut off a misbehaving J10-1984

[marc]

Friends, I was running errands yesterday and parked then turned off the 1984 j10 and it kept running. Not dieseling, have dealt with that. Drove it back home and it shut off with the key. Like the starter motor, I suspect that this is a premonition of failure of either the ignition switch or the key lock. When it wasn't shutting off, they key cylinder seemed to be loose, don't know if it was the cylinder, the linkage to the ignitions witch or the switch itself. A couple of questions, first, anybody have a similar experience?

Second, if the key doesn't work,what is the best way of shutting one of thee 258s off?

Thanks, Marc

[Stuka]

Has it only done it once?

You could start by pulling the ignition switch at the bottom of the column (easy to get too) and using a multimeter to check each of the positions. I would not be surprised if its sticking in the wrong positions. As I recall, I had one fail where it would get stuck in the start position, and would just keep the starter engaged.

If it does happen again, and your truck is an automatic, you could always pull the coil wire from the distributer or something. If its a manual, just put it in 4th gear and let out the clutch and stall it.

[rocklaurence]

As Stuka was mentioning. The ignition switch is on the bottom of the column. It has slotted mount screws for adjustment related to the key. Maybe try moving the switch too and froe to see if it helps.

[sierrablue]

If you want to shut it off, the best/fastest way is probably (carefully, making sure you don't electrocute yourself or hit anything that's grounded)(VERY important) to pull the coil wire that runs to the distributor, I would probably do the coil side so there's no more power in the wire.

Or, if you swapped HEI in (which I'm guessing you didn't, based ok the sig), pull the 12V wire to the distributor cap. You'd have to make sure that wire doesn't hit anything grounded though, until you can take the power away from it.

Unfortunately I'm not going to be much help with the ignition switch, as I never had to mess with it on the '88, and the '71 has a totally different switch.

[tgreese]

The electrical part of the ignition switch is moved by a connecting rod inside the column from the key switch. Gradual misalignment of the switch with the rod seems the most likely reason the Jeep suddenly did not shut off.