hei stinks, most of the chevy racers i hang with switch to a dizzy with seperate coil "becuase your putting the interference right back in the cap". they always move their coil as far away from the engine and wires as possible.
I have pertronix in my stock distributor. Have had it for over a year. Been trouble free. Best switch from points I ever did. I use a Master Blaster II coil. Only takes about 15 minutes to switch from points to pertronix. Cost is very low, about $75.00. I carry the old points & condenser, just in case. Have never had to use them....
While there is a lot of fuss about ohms and resistence in plugs wires etc, I am not convinced it matters all that much. The plug gap is tens of thousands of ohms.
My uncle has one on his 302 Mav. He wishes he never bought it. The thing is so big and bulky he had to go to a tiny air cleaner. He gave me some tech reasons that he doesn't like it, but I can't recall what they were at the moment. Chevy guys that are serious use magnetic trigger conversions... Maybe they should make a Duraspark housed in a Chevy distributor! Dave
ford racing use to make a hi-performance Duraspark module with rev-limiting plug in chips !! maybe they still do ?
I have a Crane Cams XR-i points-to-electronic ignition on my 302. It was easy to install and has worked fine thus far, has over 1 year and 5000 miles on it. It has a built in rev limiter too. On my 5.0 mustang i wired a GM HEI module into a Duraspark distributor and used a coil from a 4 banger mustang.. it had a real strong spark and has been working for about 2 years now.
I didn't know about that either. It's definately a good idea. To match that with an MSD box, you would need the 6AL then you would have to add one of the retard accessory boxes to it. The Duraspark box has a retard option built in. If you did have an MSD setup though, you would not need the box. The Duraspark distributor can stand alone with the MSD.
I am not taking sides, but would like to point out that the ohms at the plug gap is immaterial. Because at that point you are just bridging the gap for the sole purpose of lighting off the air/fuel mixture. Therefore, if you have losses before the gap, you don't have as strong of a spark as you might otherwise. It probably doesn't matter much if you have decent stuff to start with. But wires longer than needed, or thin wires, or to have resistance that you could otherwise do away with is sapping the spark. Just playing devil's advocate. Dave
Street car? Duraspark Street/strip? MSD, Accel or other Full ignition system (dist, box, and coil) definitely worth the money Race Car? Empty your wallet. I use an Accel 300+ CD ignition system and I love it.
The Duraspark is a CD ingnition as well... I believe that if it is done properly, it will fill your 'street/strip' slot as well. CD box with magnetic trigger, it's all in the Duraspark.
Of course, more resistence means less spark. I think most people know that. And that is definetely what the ignition companies keep telling you. But really, on a percentage basis, what is the difference between 800 and 1000 ohms in your plug wires when the final resistence in the circuit is over 30,000 ohms? Not as important as the parts mfgs woiuld have you believe....
So for a switchover to any of these what all do I need? I'm not used to points and I have little money, so what's the minimum parts etc I would need to switch over to say a Pertronix ignition (sounds cheapest and easiest for the beginner)? MSD is the way I want to go but gee, do I have that kind of $$$ laying around?
