Concerning the wires on the + side of the coil; the wire that goes back through the firewall is your main feed to the coil. The wire to the starter is meant to feed the full 12 volts to the coil during cranking. The presence of this "bypass" wire means that the other wire through the firewall should have some resistance to it to knock the voltage to the coil down somewhere in the range of 6 to 9 volts. This is done either with a ballast resistor, or the wire itself having the neccesary resistance. Turn the ignition on and measure the voltage at the + side of the coil with the points closed. If you have more than 9 volts there, this is why your points don't last. Now open the points and measure the voltage at the + side of the coil, the - side of the coil, and the ungrounded side of the points. You should have 12 volts at each of these places. If not, you have a problem somewhere.
