|
RepairmanJack,
I'm truly sorry to hear about your continuing problems.
The car should get at least 24MPG even with points. The only time my sedan got less than that was when the engine was in it's death throes (when it dropped to 20MPG). You've still got something going on with fueling, possibly drag, and of course, your ignition woes.
The only thing an electronic ignition gives you over points is the "set and forget" installation. Points require adjustment on a regular basis. Some will go 10 thousand miles between adjustments. Most points, in my experience anyway, will need to be checked at every oil change. It depends on the wear characteristics of the distributor.
Where the "power" part (and therefore MPG) of the ignition comes from is the coil. Even here, any ability of the coil over that required to cause spark is a waste of energy. Beware of the very high voltage coils. High voltage comes at the cost of current flow; just as important because energy is ultimately measured in Joules. What does it matter if the coil can produce 65KV but has no electrons available to sustain that spark? If you are running the NGK BP6 plugs gapped at 30-32 thousandths, Bosch wires, and if your coil can make 18KV, you are good to go.
There is a lot to be gained from multiple discharge setups; at least below 3000 RPM. Above that and the events come too rapidly to allow multiple spark. Idle will be smoother. Around town mileage should improve noticeably. But on the highway it won't matter a hill of beans.
Pertronix is a good unit. I know of several VW's running Pertronix and they seem to be bullet proof. There is another "in the distributor" electronic unit sold on eBay but I know nothing about it except that it is a lot cheaper than the Pertronix.
Whatever you decide, I hope this is the last of your ignition problems for at least a lustrum.
I am curious to learn what killed the Allison. What coil were you running? The Crane "Fireball" 700 (what an unfortunate name), descended from the Allison, requires a coil with at least 3.8 Ohms resistance on the primary side. That is to say, a built-in ballast resistor. Or, you can run a high energy coil as long as you make sure your ballast resistor will bring up the resistance to a minimum of 3.8 Ohms.
--
Mr. Shannon DeWolfe -- (I've taken to using Mr. because my name tends to mislead folks on the WWW. I am a 51 year old fat man ;-) -- KD5QBL
|
