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  #1  
Old 12-29-1999, 02:49 AM
Tim_K Tim_K is offline
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In my '71 Valiant daily driver, I'm currently running the stock breaker points. Everyone tells me I'll make more power by switching to electronic ignition, but I say no way, a spark is a spark is a spark.
I tried hooking up an Accel Super Coil, and it didn't go any faster in the 1/4 mile. And it melted the plastic rubbing block out of its 4 mounting rivets in 1-1/2 weeks. Went back to the stock coil.
Points may be ok on a low revving Slant Six, but what about the high rpm 273 I'm preparing? I got a dual point distributor with it, and I've heard if you stretch the springs, they're good to over 7000 rpm.
What to do?
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Old 12-29-1999, 03:29 AM
340king 340king is offline
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I would definitely go with an electronic ignition. The points system has too much dwell variance over the rpm range for good consistent spark. As the rpm goes up, the coil saturation angle goes down(measured as ° of point closure). This is because of Newton and his law that says that objects in motion tend to stay in motion, unless acted upon by an outside force. This causes the points to stay open longer reducing the coil saturation. The coil saturation is reduced by incresed rpm anyway, so the sum total effect is even greater. This is probably a whole lot more explanation than you wanted so I won't dwell on it any longer. Sorry, I couldn't resist
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Old 12-29-1999, 05:20 AM
SIXPAK340 SIXPAK340 is offline
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Go electronic, (although I still have my dual point dist. in a box...somewhere) the difference is night and day. I used a Mopar Performance Conversion kit and also MP blaster coil. Try it you'll like it.
PS: The conversion kit comes with quick advance springs, so all you'll have to stretch are the legs on that 71 Valiant.

[This message has been edited by SIXPAK340 (edited December 28, 1999).]
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Old 12-29-1999, 06:59 AM
Thunderstruck Thunderstruck is offline
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The benefits an electronic ignition gives you over points is reliability and durability. A perfect points setup isn't any worse than an EI setup, but the first time you fire it up the points systems starts to degrade, not so with the EI. With EI you don't have to worry about dwell variances and it's accompaning timing changes, especially as the rubbing block wears. You don't have points burning and pitting or corroding. It's a lot of hassle eliminated going with and EI and it's more consistance.

Steve
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Old 12-29-1999, 04:47 PM
mopar_nerd mopar_nerd is offline
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Buy the Ignitor kit! I really love this beauty...It will fit right in your old distributor without any ugly boxes, and it don't need any special coil. They say it will boost your power up to 30Hp!? It doesn't matter really, the big win is that you don't need to service the points anylonger...and it's a big buck saver comparing to Mopar Perf. conversion kit.
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  #6  
Old 12-29-1999, 04:58 PM
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Christopher Christopher is offline
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I put the Mopar kit on a 69 Dart with a /6,and it did improve performance and mileage.I did install a good set of spark plug wires also,but left the stock coil.
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Old 12-29-1999, 10:31 PM
Dart Dart is offline
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The trick way to go with the conversion to the electronic ignition is to buy a coil for a '87 2.2 turbo car. This coil is way hotter and uses an expoy medium inside of it. It dissapates heat faster and is cheap. The post connection in the coil can be removed by unscrewing the retaining screw or you can just bend your coil wire to fit the post connection.

Another thing you can also do is to jump the ballast resistor. The ballast resistor was designed to decrease the voltage going across the points so they would last longer. With the electronic set up you don't need to drop the voltage across the points because it doesn't have them.

The reliability with the EI is way better, I wouldn't even mess with the points.
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Old 01-04-2000, 02:16 AM
Tim_K Tim_K is offline
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Thanks for the responses, those are pretty much the answers I thought I'd get. I was just wondering if anyone had done anything with points for performance, since they didn't start until '71, and there were a lot of high HP musclecars racing around before then.
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Old 01-04-2000, 03:47 AM
karl karl is offline
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Tim, there were alot of high performance car running points. I owned two that were, a 68 GTX and a 70 340 Duster. Points would wear out in about 15,000 miles or less and when they went bad, they went bad. My 340 had the dual point ignition I found that by decreasing the dwell from 38 to 42 degrees down to 36 degrees dwell the car performed better, but I will say that as soon as I could afford an electronic ignition I bought one. It was a Mallory Unilite, Mopar didn't have EI at that time, the difference at the track and on the street were night and day. A points ignition will deliever about 18 KV at peak performance, and an EI will deliever about 30 to 40 KV. So increased performance, longer driveablilty and NO maintenence for a very long long time. It's up to you, but as everyone has said go EI you will be happy you did.
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