Always put your distributor on top dead center number one cylinder before removing a distributor. And please take the refrigerator temperature gauge off your elbow for the heater hose. And get a better air cleaner. The car deserves it.
Yea. I do agree that is the right way to do it. The tape method worked for me though. The valve covers are a pain to get on and off, and there is little room to get your hands over the spark plug holes so it was easier to go this route. I bought the right elbow for the coolant line a few weeks ago and haven't installed it yet. The gauge was a crude way for me to measure the temperature of the engine before I was able to wire up the autometer gauges. What air cleaner do you suggest I run? I'm running into hood clearance issues which is why I ended up with the 9" with a K&N top
@@SmackeysGarage pay no mind to these people bro, you’re doing just fine. I’m probably going to be running into the same clearance issue with my FE as well. I’m thinking of going oval air cleaner to match the Cobra Le Mans valve covers. Should look pretty slick. Cheers! 👍🏻
@@bigmike2149 I know :) Thanks for the reassurance! I'd check that your inner fenders aren't tilted inward before you put in the engine. Much easier to push them out BEFORE the engine is in place.
I am doing a complete msd make over on my truck to, I have everything for that, msd 6al box, msd pro billet distributor, msd universal plug wires, accell header plugs and a msd blaster coil and msd spark plug wire separators
I bet that was a big improvement? Looks great, plus I think this is another area that is often overlooked. It's not the sexy parts like headers, superchargers or CAI. This is where it all starts though and without great ignition you've got nothing.
Yea it definitely was a noticeable improvement in the quality of the idle on the car. My old distributor and points were probably at the point where they needed to get rebuilt anyway.
Do you think I need something like this for my setup? I already have electronic ignition, but the rest of the motor is stock. I'm working on a new intake and carb right now, headers will follow shortly after that, but no real other power changes. I'd like to do a 347 Stroker down the road, but funds just aren't available. :) Your thoughts?
You probably don't "need" this setup. I will say on my car it did really change or clean up the idle and I definitely notice it being smoother. As you go up in power, it's nice to have more control (RPM Limiter) but I'm sure you could get by with a stock style ignition if you want. By providing the plugs with multi-spark, it becomes more forgiving to not perfect tuning of fuel or spark timing which really helped me!
Direct from the battery. Unfused. I was going to come off the input side of the starter relay, but I have too many wires going to that right now... I'm probably going to have to put a junction block somewhere in that area to clean things up. If you are talking about the switched wire, I used the wire coming into the coil that was marked for the ignition.
Don't forget to check out, How To Set Timing: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-89uoFPIev7E.html To learn to set up the Rev Limiter function: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-tK9jL-Q-ZWw.html If you are having tachometer issues, I installed this to fix it: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Dkko2Po4fiU.html
In the MSD manual it recommends engines up to 10.5:1 compression use a gap between 0.050 and 0.060. Use it as a starting point until you get the best performance. Every application will be different. I started with 0.055 with my engine and had great results.
Yes that is what was quoted by Ford with the four barrel 390s that had 10.5:1 compression. There were a lot of variants as you probably know. 2bbl 9.5:1 under 300hp, 4bbl 9.5:1 with 320, etc.
@@SmackeysGarage I think original 1967-68 coupe with a needed up 390fe would be slick. Everything original but with a 'upgraded' 390 with a Simi quiet exhaust.
@Sean Johnson That is what I did... Aluminum heads, Hooker headers, and blue thunder intake. I painted it to look stock. I have all the original parts still but had to make the change for now...
Did the distributor change anyway how it sounds on my 69 it made it sound like it was burning more or faster it doesn’t really have that choppy sound anymore
Mine smoothed out the idle a bit but runs better. I still have the choppy sound with the big cam but did notice a slight change. Do you run a larger cam on yours with lots of overlap?
@@SmackeysGarage I’m honestly not sure what kind of cam it has I just recently got it and replaced the distributer but I was thinking of also getting a bigger cam to get the choppy sound back but still need to look at which one and all that
I took a quick look at the diagrams here. documents.holley.com/6425.pdf I am not an expert with HEI distributors, but all options show the gray going to the tach. If you aren't running a tach or not using the MSD 6AL tach output I would tape the gray wire up. I'm not sure if there is any difference in accuracy.
@@SmackeysGarage Thanks appreciate the help. Yeah I think I'll tape it up because I'm going to be using the tach spot on the hei distributor cap. I couldn't see why or how both would need to be used🤷 lol
Depends on how your wiring is in your car. It's a pretty much self contained system that can install in a few hours. I have no idea what labor rates are. It took me somewhere between 3-5 hours to install and have it look clean.
Do you mean without the vacuum advance? This distributor is purely mechanical. I was already getting pretty bad MPG before I swapped it out so I can't really comment on that aspect of it. I did notice a drivability improvement when I swapped over to the full MSD setup without the vacuum advance. It was one less variable for me to tinker with so simplifying it helped me get it to run better. I'm sure with a vac advance it would probably run even better on the street when tuned right.
It does not run rougher at all. I actually thought it is running better now with the full electronic ignition. My timing isn't jumping all over the place either as it was before (with the vacuum pulled). For some reason before I was having more variation in timing. With this setup, it's dead on accurate.
Hello. I would reach out to MSD and see if they have their instructions in Spanish. They have different wiring diagrams for GM cars on their website. documents.holley.com/6425.pdf
Hey Ford nut. I did not notice any extra power gain but I did notice it really helped clean up the idle. I believe the multiple spark discharge might add some more forgiveness to the tune of an engine.
