Dash Lights Good Now-Mallory to MSD ?

I am looking at the manual for my Unilite. It shows green wire to coil negative, red wire to coil positive, and brown wire to ground. Good luck,

Larry

The original coil+ wire is red and the coil- wire is blue. There should be a connector with these two wires coming from the wiring harness at the fire wall. These wires may have been connected to a dropping resister depending on the year of the car.

Thanks All,

I took out and marked all wires from the Mallory and found that a resistor is present. Did the original wiring have a resistor or was this part of the Mallory system? Re: the blue wire. I think that it has been cut. What wire is the original tack wire. The MSD system says the I need to connect to the original tack wire, any idea what that wire is?

thanks in advance...

On a 1972, the tach wire is dark blue with a black trace or strip. This wire orginally connected to the points side or (-) of the coil.
The tach will not trigger with a 12 volt pulse, the orginal connection generated several hunderd volts when the points operated. Any alternate ignition system will need to generate several hundred volt pulses with sufficent pulse width to operate the tach.

Thanks Jon3613 I'll give it a shot tonight. The MSD tach ad on must correct the pulses as you describe..

Do you have the MSD tach adapter?If you dont you will need it.Otherwise the tach does not work with the MSD.Part # 8920

Yes I have the tach adapter, it's mounted but not hooked up yet. I hooked the 6A box, blaster 3 coil and stabbed the distributor etc. hit the key and it fired. There is a blue wire with a wide black line which went to the Mallory (-) side of the Mallory coil and I assume this is the tach wire, I may get a chance to try it tonight. I have another problem though. The distributor I got is a part #MSD-8580 which is to high for the engine cover and even my air cleaner. I called Summit and they said the the low profile dist. is only for a crank triggered ignition. I asked them if the part# MSD-8577 is lower and they said no and there is no other dist that would work. I just got off the phone to MSD and they said Summit was wrong, the 8577 IS 1/4" lower and smaller dia than the 8580. Now I hope that Summit will take a return even if I ran it for a honest, second. What part# is every one else using for a distributor?

Yes....... The 8577 (Pro-Billet model) is the one you want. Mine also had the MSD "fathat" unit that was too big (plus the advance was siezed) and caught the air cleaner, and also forced the front wires to rub against the engine cover.

I've got the 8577 running into an MSD6A and a tach adapter..........works perfect.


Bob

Thanks Bob,
I ordered the 8577 today. Btw, I already cut the back of the air cleaner steel (Ford Racing chrome) to clear the wires and depressed the tab to catch the cover at the window (to change the timing) because Summit said I was out of luck. I should have asked the community first. Oh, what color wire did you hook the tach adapter to? Blue with thick black line? If you don't remember don't crawl under the car to check.. thanks

curt

curt. Just put the car up on the lift and here's what I saw.

White - plugs into side of MSD6A unit port
Red - power to rt side front of solenoid (small terms)
Purple - spliced into thick blue w/black stripe

Bob

There is, or used to be, an Accel distributor that was a better fit for the Pantera. Check: www.panteraplace.com The Accel distributor cost less than MSD version. I just went through this size problem this spring, low profile and small cap.
I bought a Ford 1976 distributor for a 460 CI. it drops in and has the magnetic reluctor so there is no point bounce or cam wear to have to deal with. Since there are no points the bearing doesn't work hard and sleeve bearings are fine. This is the fix that the guys used years ago when there weren't many after-market distributors. I paid about $55 from NAPA. Not all is lost ... You can sell the MSD on Ebay, they re-sell very well.

Thanks for checking Bob,
Went to your web site I can see why you said "lift". Great setup. I like boats also, I've got a old sunchaser (like a tahiti) jet with a 454, lot's of fun. As far as the Accel I did have a duel pointer way back in the 70's in a 68 mustang with a 390, I'm sure they are just as good now. It worked great at the time but I like MSD now, thanks Jon

curt