Petronix failures?

[Huskinhano]

Just curious, has anyone here had one go bad? I think the one in my 66 Mustang just died. My car had been sitting at work for about the last 5 years and during this point I had installed one. I connected it to a 12 volt source by passing the resistor wire and I'm also using their coil. My Mustang was running like crap with a steady misfire at idle. When I got my car home I was trying to find out which cylinder(s) were the culprits by pulling off the ignition wires at the cap when it just stopped running and won't restart, yes there's gas and the plugs and wires are in good shape gaped to .035

I hang out at a Mustang forum as well and Petronix failures are not uncommon. I'm not trying to trouble shoot whether mine failed or not, which I believe it did. I'm wondering what peoples experiences on Petronix is here? I guess I'll swap back in the points for the time being. I think I'll try the Crane Hy Fire.

[dieselgeek]

Re: Petronix failures?

Odd, I use the heck out of them on conversions form points to EFI spark/fuel. BUT I don't use them to trigger coils, I use them to output a square wave for a computer to pick up. I think using them with coils is a lot more wear and tear on the internals...

thus, my post isn't really relevant to yours. But I am looking out my window and watching my neighbor, as I make this post, mow his pasture with his 1947 Case VAC-60 tractor, which has a pertronix module in the distributor, feeding tach signal to a megasquirt which runs a rochester TBI... he's been running it that way for 4 years

One way to tell for sure how it's working, is if you have an oscilloscope... it should have a nice square wave on the coil trigger output.

-scott

[TheSilverBuick]

Re: Petronix failures?

I've ran one so far for a year so far in my Thunderbird. It runs the coil, I how ever did not run the full 12v to it, I just connected it to the standard resistor coil wire. I run my Megasquirt tach signal off the negative terminal of the Coil, and according to Scott it's a clean signal (certainly doesn't jump around).

[Scott Liggett]

Re: Petronix failures?

I've had issues with the one on a 64 Caddy that I've been working on. I went back and rewired the ignition wiring and added a resister block. It made the difference. I've stuck four of these in different cars and this is the only problem I've ever encountered.

The coil could be getting rediculously hot without the resistor on your stang and losing a ton of spark. The resistor is for the coil, not the points.

Also, make sure you don't have too much or too little play in your distributor. .010 minimum and .060 maximum between the wheel and the pickup.

[jays67]

Re: Petronix failures?

i have had issues with them and also cooked a few crane xr-1 but the crains were because my coil opps
the petronix i had misses,hard starts etc...

[JOES66FURY]

Re: Petronix failures?

no issues with mine, I have heard they dont "go bad" they just work or dont...dunno how true that is

[milner351]

Re: Petronix failures?

The one I put in our '54 belair has been fine for a few years.
One my buddy put in his '69 351W XR7 convertible freaked out with really weird drivability issues - that cleared up with the original points and condenser re - installed.

I think the crane conversion (with the rev limiter built in all under the cap) is the way I'd go now.

[49F1]

Re: Petronix failures?

the 1 in my truck triggers the coil and it's 6 yrs old, still working

[squirrel]

Re: Petronix failures?

pulling the plug wires at the cap is a very bad way to test an electronic ignition, it allows the 10,000+ volt spark to travel back into the electronics and blow it out. btdt with an HEI many many years ago.

[NASBackyard]

Re: Petronix failures?

Not on the 3 that I've installed, however, I've had a hard time finding a rotor that will work on my 440. it seems like it won't fit right so I'm using the same one I started with 6 years ago.

[ls7gto]

Re: Petronix failures?

Only ever had one go bad, after a friend swapped starters, his nova wouldnt re start. long story short, I found a bad unit. swapped it, no problems since. now did he do something dumb...... probably!

[Huskinhano]

Re: Petronix failures?

Pass the Dofuss award my way. It appears when I was pulling the wires off the cap, I must have moved the cap, catching the rotor. I found the rotor in about a dozen little pieces. Haven't had time to install a new one yet.

[Eliteman76]

Re: Petronix failures?

Aside from you figuring out the issue, some of the guys on various Torino forums I wander in and out of have had mxed results, sort of like here.
Myself, I stuck it out with the duraspark ignition off a previous Ford Elite with a 351w...I swapped in my 351c, and simply used a 400 duraspark unit off my '77 tbird, and that engine has run great aside from when I've manage to set the timing off 180 degrees after priming it.

I'm curous though, how the heck does one destroy a rotor? That's a new one for me.

[TheSilverBuick]

Re: Petronix failures?

I'm curous though, how the heck does one destroy a rotor? That's a new one for me.

Working at Autozone for three years I saw a fair share of melted and broken rotors come in. Not meant to be a dig, but the majority of them were Ford rotors. I still have no idea short of taking a lighter or torch to them how they get that way. One I saw came out of a co-worker's '89 Mustang to know it wasn't some kind of intentional abuse.

[Scott Liggett]

Re: Petronix failures?

I once seen a rotor shatter. It was a Ford, but I accidentally put a 6 cylinder rotor on a V8 distributor. It was misboxed and they look nearly alike.