electronic ignition to points

[DNFXDLI]

I was looking at that too Duncan, want a better spark, seems that I have to set the timing off the 8 degrees quite a bit to prevent it from knocking and pinging. (I use Chevron gas, none of that cheap brand). Now it doesn't have the power. I've adjusted the fuel /air with a vacuum gauge. Do you think it might be the mechanical advance?

Not sure...you need to make sure that you are TDC before checking the timing.
On the gas note, up here in the Great White North, gasoline is very consistent across the board and brand really doesn't matter...my family was in the oil/gas business for many years and I was for several.
A big thing is people putting premium in there tanks thinking that it is better..not so....unless you have the CR to support it, a higher octane can reduce perfomance....higher octane burns slower..

I replaced the factory distributor with a HEI I found on Ebay for about $50. It's a billet housing with GM internals and 1 wire hook up. Sure did clean up the engine compartment and the engine runs better!

So you put a GM part on your Ford?...what is this world coming to?
The Duraspark is a great system.



GM sucks...always has, always will...and will, until the end of time or the Zombies take over...be hosing all taxpayers out of there hard earned $$.
GM...Obama Motors....and they suck.
Did I mention they suck?
That is all.



They suck.

 

[77FordTruckMan]

Cool, I'm thinking of swapping to HEI. Heard it's a one wire hook-up? Let us know how it goes and could you post a few pic's

I'm a little late, but here you go

This one wasn't one wire, it was 3. I had to get a resistor thing and it hooks up to the coil through that and also to the ignition. The engine runs a lot smoother but I kinda liked it better when the truck shook with the way it ran before... Unfortunately my gas mileage seems unaffected, 7.3mpg last time I checked which is pretty rough for a daily driver. I also have symptoms of the timing being off both ways... occasional run-on and slow cranking. So overall probably not worth it, but my old distributor was giving me problems.

 

[BigNate]

Sorry to dig this up but am looking into options. I want to have reliability but it needs to be field serviceable as I wind up way back in the wild and if the old truck can't get me home it'd suck!
I've wondered if the DUI one wire is worth it. It seems the advance curve has to be very specific to work well, and without pulling the cam to find out what it is it doesn't seem like it'd be worth the trouble. Would a spare points type distributor be easier to swap out in the woods vs carrying spares for the entire Duraspark setup?

 

[Fellro]

It doesn't matter what distributor you use, the advance curve needs to match what works for the engine. All there is to changing it is weights and springs, which are extremely easy to do on the GM style distributor. If you are wanting something quick to change out in the back country, stay with the points and get familiar with how to set them. You don't have to swap distributors at all with them unless they are worn out.