I was all excited about having a pertronix unit installed in my classic mustang, but it has been a bust. Today the system just melted down and now I need a new distributor, cap and rotor. Should have kept it simple like the old saying goes. My question is this...how many of you are running Pertronix and how has it done for you. Until this I really hadn't heard of any bad press. Then I decided to investigate seeing as there are less than 100 miles on it and seems that these units have a record of failure. Heck of a lot easier to replace the points than have a meltdown or potential fire in my engine bay. Your thoughts and experiences with these units are welcomed and encouraged.

 

which pertronix unit did you get?

 

It was an ignitor model. Don't remember the exact model # but I could try and find it if you think it would be useful. P.S. nice avatar

 

I've run a pertronix before. It worked great, until it didn't. It started acting up, causing a sporatic misfire.

100mi seems like there might be something else wrong, however. We need to know which specific unit it was; the Ignitor, Ignitor II, or Ignitor III. The original Ignitor runs on ~8V, which is what your factory wiring will supply to the ignition. The Ignitor II and III require 12V to function properly, which also requires a different coil with an internal resistor. In addition, some of the units (not sure which) require a coil with an internal resistance within a certain range. Mess up the source voltage or the coil and you can fry the ignition.

One of my friends went through his Ignitor, my spare, and another replacement until he figured out that the coil he was using didn't have enough resistance, which put a lot of current through the transistor in the Ignitor and burned it out.

 

Mine has been running for several years now on a 408 stroker. I am running thier coil, and I followed the instructions to a tee, including making sure I had a good 12V going to it.

Good luck on sorting things out!

 

Thanks for the replies. I was running an original ignitor (EDIT: NOT the ignitor II or III) in the car. Sounds like it could be a problem with the amount of resistance. I did have a shop install it so I assumed they would know how to do it correctly. I think I'm just going to go back to points though...they worked for thousands of cars back in they day, and I don't need to get stranded anywhere :/

 

I had no problems with my original ignitor for years. I was using their (Pertronix) Flamethrower coil. I always assumed and/or hoped that the problems people were having with the ignitors were due to inproper power, grounding, or even components.

Now I'm running the Flamethrower distributor and have not had any problems (yet). I ended up replacing my distributor because I had too much slop. So I have to ask - why do you have to replace your distributor and cap? Did it actuall melt?

Good luck.

 

I have had the Pert II for two years and besides dropping the oil pump shaft while installing I have had a really good experience. I do occasionally have a moment or two of rough runnning but usually if I pull over everything resets after a second and then it is smooth sailing. They do seem to be affected by hotter weather/temp. I have the 12v bypass though I didnt at first.

 

Yea it doesn't look good in there. I've read some about the Duraspark II and may end up going that way. In the short research I've done it seems they'll go right into the 200 engines. I'll attach some pics of what it looked like after the melt down. Sad thing is I'll never really know what happened since I wasn't there when it happened. Seems like it could have been a number of things from not enough resistance to the solenoid sticking open and or it not a good enough ground (EDIT: although the wiring harness and wiring in the car is all brand new).

 

Wow, that is seriously messed up. I have never before seen a distributor burn up like that.

On 289s I used the dual point OEM distributors (OEM on 289 hypo) and MSD wires & coil. I used these for years with no issues or failures. If I was running an electronic trigger distributor I would also run the MSD box.
I got the dual point distributors as OEM rebuilds from a regular parts store, they were fairly cheap.