And so common now with everybody taking back thousands of parts that 'don't work'. The vendors constantly shoved numbers in O'Reilly's face showing 80% or some number close of all returns claimed not working or damaged have nothing wrong with them at all.They simply rebox and sell them again. Rather something wrong with the brain that installed them. I watched it personally hundreds of times. No insult intended here at all of course. Just why every part you see now seems to have been handled previously, it HAS BEEN.
'.........didnt like the way the pickup was wired in, it's not a factory type junction with the rubber block that holds it in the distributor body, its a pile of silicone that has already cracked form moving around.'
In that case shoddy rebuild and just like Cardone who does stuff like that all the time. They know full well there were issues with that harness to pickup going bad when oil mist coming up through dist shaft affects the harness to soften rubber, then it begins to short internally. A big problem. Cardone probably testing pickup, it checks as good while not mishandling it and glue it back down to sell part. Probably a correct part shortage in there somewhere as well.
When I see minor issues like that on rebuilds I commonly fix them to not ever go bad again rather than risk getting an even worse part second time around. That commonly happens. Getting where I do something to fix every part I get now, the rebuild quality has totally gone to crap. If you leave it 'up to them' to get it right then expect issues, the Chinese doing this work do not care. Not even a little bit. I watched people who insisted on 100% correct part buy as many as 5 and then give up, not doable. Sure, you're entitled to a 100% good and correct part, but things today are not what they used to be. I've watched someone with that idea firmly in his head lose his butt completely (alternator clutch issues) like with Ford Motor Co. themselves over quality issues on a brand new car. Often it can be better to take the small screwing rather than make it much much worse. In my view if 80% (there's that number again!) of the rebuild job is right I will fix to guarantee the last 20% myself and then drive a thoroughly reliable part for years until it is dead. It saves me patience, Lord knows I need all of that I can get.
I can pull just about any rebuilt part on the planet out of the box and find issues with it. Now that common. You'd be simply amazed at how many like alternators come out with the field connections not cut short like required, they then short out against outer case to make alt not work right out of the box. With starters they commonly screw any connectors on the bakelite too tight and cracked right out of box. Can't count how many I saw like that. Other issues, bushings that easily fall out with no pressfit as required, the list goes on forever.