Also, check for any grind marks on armature plate or you could have problems even with a new coil. Also if the coil is not flush all the way around,too far in or too far out it of the cover it may not operate right.
But yeah, magnetizing the coil with 12 volts should pull the armature plate back against the coil and put enough drag to causes the rollers to cam up and engage the hubs when spinning the pinion. I would first double check you are getting power there at the connector and the ohms of the coil.
