Ok Spanky,
Here my bit to see if I can help. I have read your post from start to finish and do feel for ya.
Go back to absolute basics with a tick list and check stuff off. You only need fuel/air in the right ratio, compression and spark at the right time. We can pretty much rule out compression as we have 8 to play with. Have you got fuel? Does the carb squirt from the accel pump when moved. I know it sounds stupid but do check. Its also possible that so much messing around has fouled the plugs with fuel and got itself to a point where even with good ignition you will have trouble starting. You must have a good battery, if the voltage is low from cranking then you will be into volt drop issues.
Go through this list
Fuel check
Clean plugs, heat with a torch if wet.
Verify your base No1 cylinder timing position on compression. The rotor arm should pretty much point at number one cylinder when its correct. 10 to 15 deg either way should still fire.
Measure batt voltage and stick on charge overnight and start fresh for the next test. Should be about 12.5 with nothing on, anything under 12v is *****d or flat.
Verfiy your lead position on the cap and plugs.
Assuming you have fuel, try this, with coil lead removed from the distributor cap, switch on the ignition, flick the points with a small insulated screwdriver. You should get a spark from the coil lead. If you dont, you have duff or dirty points doesnt take more than a speck, bad connections to or from the coil, or a faulty capacitor/condensor. This item is a common failure item which short circuits the points preventing energy from charging the coil. Intermittent breakdown is common. It is there to prevent the points from arcing and burning by absorbing the flash. The engine should run with it disconnected but you will have bad arcing at the points and they wont last 5 mins.
If you have spark at the coil lead I would go back over other stuff like carb and fuel, vac leaks, etc. Its the damn obvious that always catches us out because we dismiss it. I once serviced an old V8 english car over here that was running fine. I replaced all the ignition components with new thinking it would run great. Wouldnt start. WTF? Long story short turned out the contact on the points was totally open circuit to the spring even though its a welded connection!! Stuck the old points back and it ran beautiful after a few days of grief and expense.
Good luck Jon
