Hi David,

A meter on the coil terminal 1, or the Rex equivalent, should bounce between zero and around 10 volts. Depending on the ballistics of the movement it might not quite make zero or swing all the way to 10, but it surely won't catch the short spike as the coil collapses.

I agreed with your interpretation of the nudged tach needle during cranking. Tach needle live implies distributor timing output (or wherever the ignition is made). It is the presumption of the inverse of this implication, tach needle not live implies no distributor timing output, that I believe is fallacious.
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Art Benstein near Baltimore