By Anonymous (209.204.154.250) on Saturday, December 29, 2001 - 09:00 am:

For those of you that converted from points to electronic ignition... does the coil needs to be replaced as well?

Pertronix claimed to be able to delover 40000 volts, and I am wondering if the stock/OEM coil is rated for it? Pertronix sells a Flame_Thrower coil for such application. Is it worth it?

By mo (24.69.255.202) on Saturday, December 29, 2001 - 10:53 am:

gotta switch the coil too ..
have fun!!
mo

By ddechon (12.91.130.215) on Saturday, December 29, 2001 - 11:40 am:

You will have added performance if you buy it the new coil but I thought either one will work. Give it a try without the new coil.

Your new ignition specs might instruct you to change the coil, but I don't think it will. The output from the new ignition should match the old ignition (approx 12 Volts) when the points are closed. If the output of the old ignition matches the output of the new igniton, you don't need a new coil. I would think the new ignition system would deliver as much as the old.

For example:
If 9 volts are coming into the coil instead of 12, you might have installed the new ignition wrong, or you might need a bigger coil to make up for the loss of power from the new ignition.

In short, try the old coil first. Buy the big one for added performance.


Darrell

By Don (209.181.52.36) on Saturday, December 29, 2001 - 11:53 am:

You may give the old coil a try, but get your boots on and you hich hiking thumb ready!

By ddechon (12.91.130.215) on Saturday, December 29, 2001 - 12:25 pm:

Good Point Don.

I read the other string and was hoping somebody with experience would know. I was thinking the opposite...as if the new ignition would deliver less.

Just curious,
What is the new ignition contructed of? If coils are burning up, is it possible to increase the gap in the electronic ignition to decrease the power to the the coil...so you don't burn it up?

Darrell

By Don (209.181.52.33) on Saturday, December 29, 2001 - 02:11 pm:

Nope, the Pertonix is magneticly triggered so as long as the field is "seen" by the module it pulls the same amount of amps. The 12V Accel Super Stock coils are around 29.95 at the big parts dicounters. So that should not hurt anyone too bad. You dont need to run a resisor,unless you have some super low primary resitance coil.
The Pertonix, MSD blaster, Accel superstock coils all work with the Pertonix conversion.

By Joe (209.204.154.250) on Saturday, December 29, 2001 - 03:18 pm:

The spec of the Flame Thrower says 3 ohms for standard and 1.5 ohms for racing version. I'd assume the difference is probably from different gauge wire used. Flame Thrower appears to priced pretty close to Accel.

Does anyone know the spec for the Honda Civic OEM coil?

How about the Accel SuperStock?

By ddechon (12.91.130.47) on Monday, December 31, 2001 - 06:25 am:

Primary Coil Resistance 3.8 +/-.38 ohms
Secondary Coil Resistance 8.0 +/-1.6 ohms
Specified Voltage 12 Volts
Test Gap at 8 Volts 8mm
Insulation Resistance 10 Meg. Ohms

When using an ohm meter, don't forget to check the zero reading by touching the leads together. Any resistance in the leads should be compensated for by zeroing the meter or subrating the zero amount from your readings on the coil.

Darrell

By ddechon (12.91.130.47) on Monday, December 31, 2001 - 06:26 am:

That's for the OEM coil.

By david (198.245.131.55) on Friday, January 04, 2002 - 03:00 pm:

i had a guy at a shop around town tell me that he could convert the stock electronic ignition from an 80's datsun into a ist gen civic dizzy and that it would be much more stable and give better performce than the petronix. he said it would cost about $90 to do it.
does anyone have experience with that kind of thing? this guy could just be talking out of his butt. i guess he's been working with old datsuns and honda's(more datsuns) for a while.

david

By Don (209.181.52.77) on Friday, January 04, 2002 - 06:00 pm:

Sounds like he was taking you for a ride, Why would you want to go to all that trouble to put an old ignition in your car when the pertronix is less expensive and stone reliable.

By ddechon --Maryland-- (12.91.131.164) on Friday, January 04, 2002 - 09:26 pm:

You just took him for a ride. Go to junk yard and pull it out of a datsun. I think it could work, but I don't know if it's more reliable.

Darrell

By Don (209.181.52.10) on Friday, January 04, 2002 - 10:00 pm:

No I didn't, you dont even know what year Datsun to get and David is not a mechanic, he is learning. I have spent hrs on the phone (he lives 5 hrs away) with David, talking him through car problems that still are not fixed all the way. Its your turn now
David and 99.9 % of people with $79.95 + coil will be happy with the Pertonix and its 5 minute install.

Add it up, if you get the Datsun system for $25-40 minimum at a wrecker and spend a day farting with it and it may work and it may not. Then if it does not work you have to figure out if it was the old parts or something else. Did you save anything? Nope.

I would do the gen 2 conversion before messing with Datsun stuff.

By ddechon --Maryland-- (12.91.131.164) on Friday, January 04, 2002 - 10:10 pm:

Hmmmm

http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1402780004

http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=599876288

I'm not sure if these have points.
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=600032565

By Don (209.181.52.10) on Friday, January 04, 2002 - 10:23 pm:

The first two are parts catalogs/picture books, the local parts store will look stuff up or let you look if they like you, for free so why buy those? The last one is an install kit. Gasket O-ring etc...

By Bryan Maloof (66.32.88.105) on Saturday, January 05, 2002 - 08:32 am:

I have installed a good many pertronix kits, mostly in V-8's. I have found them to be reliable, and easy to install. The other thing is, they will put out a good bit more energy when you give them a true 12v. supply. It almost doubles the spark out of the coil compared to a resisted wire like comes out of a points type wiring harness.

Also, a stock coil puts out about 35k volts and that is plenty if all else is a good working order.

Bryan

By errol (152.163.195.196) on Sunday, January 06, 2002 - 10:09 pm:

I bought a Crane '700' ignition from JC Whitney and installed it in about 35 min. (most of the time spent making sure I did it right) on my 76 wagon (it replaced the points)

By barry mcfarlane (165.228.128.11) on Wednesday, January 09, 2002 - 06:44 pm:

David, I have a 1973 Datsun 1200 and a 1973 Honda Civic (EB1). The distributer in both is virtually identical; same manufacturer, internals, points etc. The favoured upgrade for the Datsun is to get an electronic distributer from the later A15 engine which drops straight into the 1200 engine. This distrubuter is by all accounts very reliable. It sound like your mechanic is suggesting adapting the A15 distributer internals to the Civic distributer body. Barry

By Adrian (Civicguru) (165.228.11.61) on Wednesday, January 09, 2002 - 07:10 pm:

I don't understand you guys. Why all this talk about mucking around adapting Datsun dizzys (which I would suspect spin the wrong way, but not sure)? All you need to do is go out and pick up an EN1 Civic dizzy, stick on an extra adjuster plate and bolt it in.

By Don (209.181.52.89) on Wednesday, January 09, 2002 - 10:19 pm:

Some people just dont listen
O' well we tried.

By mo (24.69.255.202) on Friday, January 11, 2002 - 07:28 am:

so, don, what yer sayin is ....

By david (198.245.131.55) on Friday, January 11, 2002 - 01:16 pm:

hey, i realized that the EN1 dizzy or the petronix would be good options, but if for some reason the datsun conv. was more stable and/or reliable i wasn't going to write it off. thats why i brought it up here.
i think the petronix is going to be my choice in this one. as don said, i've had too many "little" problems that have turned into huge messes that still arn't completely solved yet. as little hassle as possible will be much appereciated.
really i'm worried about changing my timing belt, and my struts, and my entire brake system. i don't need anymore complications.
you'll probably be hearing from my more in the next couple of months.
david