can someone help me identify what or where to start...Very frustrated here...
Yellow wire running from side of distributor goes... where?
a wire got burned somewhere i the wiring harness behind the engine (I think)..I think I have narrowed it down to the wires coming out of the side of the distributor that runs into a big cluster (a mess) behind the engine, but I am not sure where this yellow wire runs down to???

 

Sam89, I would like to help you but I need to know what year, make, and model were looking at.

 

sorry.. should have posted this info..
1989 camaro z28 5.7
this is not the engine that came in the car I am not sure what year the engine is.

 

The 87 5.7 TPI does not have a yellow wire from the dist. You probably mean either the tan wire, or the white wire. The dist wiring is as follows: There are two connectors, one 4 pin, one 2 pin. The 2 pin connector has one white wire, one pink wire. The white is B- (primary ignition pulse) to the coil. The pink wire is batt+ power supply to the dist, from the coil connector. If functioning properly, the dist will generate spark with just the pink and white wires connected. The 4 wire connector contains a tan wire, a black/red wire, a ppl/wht wire, a white wire. The tan wire is "EST on" signal. The ECM sends a 5v signal to the ICM across this wire to turn on the EST timing control. The black/red wire is dist case ground to ECM. Purple/ white wire is crank referrence to ECM. White wire is EST timing control signal. When EST is turned on(above 400RPM), ECM sends digital pulses to ICM, across this white wire, generating spark events according to the ECM's calculated spark advance.