Keep in mind, Comp Cams has been selling TriTec Poly Composite distributor gears, for Chevy, Dodge and some Ford applications, for many years. Ford Motorsport sells them too. The 351C/460 gear is a recent application. If you ask Comp Cams what the best dist. gear is, they'll tell you it's the composite gear. If you don't want to spend the $, they'll suggest one of the traditional melonized iron, steel or bronze gears (depending on your application). You can also use a new composite dist. gear with an "old" cam and vice versa.
What caused the delay in bringing the 351C/460 gear to market was TriTec's inability to determine the correct dimensions. Ford could not help them because the original blueprints had been destroyed long ago. That is, Ford ordered them shredded a long time ago. Luckily, a long time Ford employee realized what a mistake that was and removed them from the "to be shredded" file. From there they disappeared! An anonymous Pantera owner (
Prior to receiving definitive information, TriTec had purchased a number of 351C/460 distributors and distributor gears in an attempt to determine the correct dimensions. What they found was, the I.D.'s of the gears they purchased varied quite a bit. They assumed the Duraspark and OEM dist. gear were correct but they couldn't understand why reputable manufacturers would vary from OEM dimensions. One gear they checked fell off of the distributor shaft when the pin was removed. TriTec said that without the proper interference fit between the distributor shaft and the gear, the pin would fail in short order!!! I don't recall the correct specification but a 351C distributor gear should be a "light press fit" on the distributor shaft. Also, always check to make sure the distributor gear is installed at the correct height on the distributor shaft. Ford Motorsport has a good instruction sheet on their web site, that tells you how to do this.
The moral of the story is; just because you bought your dist. and/or your dist. gear from MSD, Crane, Accel or Mallory, don't assume it's correct. Check everything before you decide to rely on it!