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Distributor wiring help

Posted: 28 Jun 2010 20:17
by 64grandsport
So, I bought this car that was suposed to have had electrical problems. The previous owner had killed the distributor trying to get it out. The motor was killed and I built a new motor. I used a distributor that has an external amplifier. Some of my wires have lost their color, and now I am stuck. I have two leads coming out of the amp one white and one white with a black tracer. Where do these go? ALSO, I have a ballast resistor that I have no idea where to hook it up. I did find two wires that have 12V with the switch on. Both look white, one may have a faded yellow tracer, Any expert on this that may be able to help me, a phone number sure would be nice in USA
thanks

Posted: 29 Jun 2010 01:44
by 64grandsport
OK.... SO I found this

The amplifier receives the negative 12v supply through its casing so it must be fixed to a part of the car which is earthed.

The 12v ignition supply connects to the plain white wire to power the electronics inside it. (the positive side of the ignition coil may be supplied through a ballast resistor on your vehicle so its probably best to take power from the battery side of the resistor so you get the full 12 volts.

The negative side of the ignition coil then connects to the white/black wire from the amplifier. The switching current then comes from the white/black amplifier wire. Then just plug the cable in from the distributor to the amplifier so the distributor can control what the amplifier sends to the coil.

I set it up like this and still have no spark. The distributor is new old stock. Is there any way to trouble shoot that amplifier? Any way to tell if it is bad? Can you bypass it?
thanks to all

Posted: 29 Jun 2010 02:10
by PeterTR7V8
Does the diagram in this link help? http://mgaguru.com/mgtech/ignition/pics/pma50b.gif

What brand of ignition system is it? Do you have a 12V reading on the coil terminals? If you do & there is no spark to to distributor then change the coil. If not then it may be the ignition module. I'm not an expert on ignition sorry but hopefully one will be with you in a minute.[:)]

Image

The map: http://tinyurl.com/wedgemap . The blog: http://www.forum.triumphtr7.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=8548

Posted: 29 Jun 2010 08:59
by 64grandsport
this is exactly how I have it wired. The coil has 12V on the positive side, but is brand new from Victoria British.

Posted: 02 Jul 2010 00:22
by 64grandsport
Well, I got my wiring sorted and have a problem with the ballast. I found that the CEI unit was bad and found that one from a 1980 camaro was the same. BUT the ballast is bad. This could have been what killed the CEI unit. Does anyone know how many ohms that this resistor is and or what a advance store replacement one would be. Do I have to wait a week to get one in?
thannks