Daves55Sedan
Well-known member
I know, you will be SHOCKED to hear that I converted my '55 Ford ignition to Pertronix.
I must have seven or eight sets of burned out points in a box; each had been filed many times and re-used for many,many years. I knew this set was on its last leg, and finally this morning, it took three cranks to get her started. After installing the Pertronix ignitor, she fired up instantly on the first crank.
At first, I thought I would remove the dizzy altogether, but I hate having to put it back in. I can never get the gear to engage in the same position it came out. So I decided to leave the dizzy in the engine. It was necessary for me to wear my reading glasses through the entire operation as my eyesight ain't what it used to be. My engine has the original load-o-matic distributor, which is much more shallow than the later dizzy's.
After removing the points and condenser and the wire to the coil, I wiped the breaker plate and cam clean as suggested in the installation instructions. I got a length of solid 22 gage copper wire and wrapped a little of it around the ignitor wires to use as a guide to pull the wires thru the hole in the side of the dizzy below the breaker plate. I thought I would have more trouble worming the wire thru the hole, but it wasn't that bad. As soon as the ignitor wires cam thru the hole, my guide wire came off, so I got lucky. I was able to grab the wires with my fingers and pull them thru the hole. You need to be real careful not to use the wires themselves to pull the rubber seal into the hole, because the wires will tend to pull thru the seal making them tighten underneath the breaker plate. Consequently, I elected not to attempt to get the seal to snap into place fully, but theres enough rubber sqeezed thru the hole that it will not move.
The ignitor mounting plate was a perfect fit, without the need to do any filing or drill any holes. The unit was shipped with nice mounting screws. There is no adjustment required with this model. You simply align the ignitor mounting plate so that the three holes on the left end of the plate match with the features of the dizzy breaker plate and screw it down. Then, the magnet slips down over the cam. Jiggle the magnet a little bit to align the magnet with the cam high points before pressing the magnet down over the cam.
Since this is a 6-volt positive ground system, the wiring is a little differnt than with the 12 volt units. The ingitor has two wires. One wire connects directly to the "start" wire (formerly connected to the negative terminal at the coil. The second wire from the ignitor connects to the negative terminal at the coil now.
In the event that I might ever need to switch back to points and condenser in an emergency, I decided NOT to snip off my ring tongue terminal at the "start" wire. I made a insulated standoff for attaching the ignitor wire to the start wire and used a machine screw, nut and lockwasher to attach it to a factory hole at the flange where the cowl meets the firewall, just above the heater duct. The material I used was a piece of 1/8 inch masonite, cut 1/2 inch wide x 1-1/2 inch long with two holes drilled in it. One for mounting at the cowl, and the other to accept a # 8 machine screw with flatwashers, lockwasher and nut to use for attaching the ring tongue terminals of the two wires.
Now it is necessary to make a new wire for connected the positive side of the coil to ground somewhere. I found a length of 14 gage wire with a properly sized ring tongue terminal already on one end for connecting to the coil. (I keep a large box of automotive wiring in the garage). I added a larger size terminal at the other end of the wire for connecting to the existing ground lug at the firewall, which is connected to the engine.
My rotor was in pretty bad shape. I used a small wire brush and crocus cloth to shine up the electrode which makes contact with the dizzy cap towers. The underside of the towers looked okay. Put the cap back on and it was finished. The engine started immediately on the first crank. I jumped out and checked the timing with an inductive timing light. She was right on the money.
The engine starts more quickly and runs as good as ever. The whole installation only took me about two hours and that was with the dizzy still in the engine. That time includes messing around making the little standoff bracket for the wires, hunting thru scraps of wire for a wire long enough for my ground connection, sifting thru my box of electric wiring accessories for suitable wire terminals AND getting all the tools put back away.
Tools I used: 5/16 wrench for removing wire from points, 3/8" nutdriver for removing coil wires, two straitblade screwdrivers, one long and one short for removal of points/condenser & installation of the ignitor, one piece of solid 22 gage pull/guide wire, jigsaw for cutting out masonite, stone grinder for grinding masonite corners smoothe and rounded, drill and 1/8 inch bit for drilling holes in masonite, one combination wire-stripper/snips and terminal crimper, 11/32 inch nutdriver for attaching standoff bracket to cowl and for connecting ignitor and "start" wires to the standoff.
I must have seven or eight sets of burned out points in a box; each had been filed many times and re-used for many,many years. I knew this set was on its last leg, and finally this morning, it took three cranks to get her started. After installing the Pertronix ignitor, she fired up instantly on the first crank.
At first, I thought I would remove the dizzy altogether, but I hate having to put it back in. I can never get the gear to engage in the same position it came out. So I decided to leave the dizzy in the engine. It was necessary for me to wear my reading glasses through the entire operation as my eyesight ain't what it used to be. My engine has the original load-o-matic distributor, which is much more shallow than the later dizzy's.
After removing the points and condenser and the wire to the coil, I wiped the breaker plate and cam clean as suggested in the installation instructions. I got a length of solid 22 gage copper wire and wrapped a little of it around the ignitor wires to use as a guide to pull the wires thru the hole in the side of the dizzy below the breaker plate. I thought I would have more trouble worming the wire thru the hole, but it wasn't that bad. As soon as the ignitor wires cam thru the hole, my guide wire came off, so I got lucky. I was able to grab the wires with my fingers and pull them thru the hole. You need to be real careful not to use the wires themselves to pull the rubber seal into the hole, because the wires will tend to pull thru the seal making them tighten underneath the breaker plate. Consequently, I elected not to attempt to get the seal to snap into place fully, but theres enough rubber sqeezed thru the hole that it will not move.
The ignitor mounting plate was a perfect fit, without the need to do any filing or drill any holes. The unit was shipped with nice mounting screws. There is no adjustment required with this model. You simply align the ignitor mounting plate so that the three holes on the left end of the plate match with the features of the dizzy breaker plate and screw it down. Then, the magnet slips down over the cam. Jiggle the magnet a little bit to align the magnet with the cam high points before pressing the magnet down over the cam.
Since this is a 6-volt positive ground system, the wiring is a little differnt than with the 12 volt units. The ingitor has two wires. One wire connects directly to the "start" wire (formerly connected to the negative terminal at the coil. The second wire from the ignitor connects to the negative terminal at the coil now.
In the event that I might ever need to switch back to points and condenser in an emergency, I decided NOT to snip off my ring tongue terminal at the "start" wire. I made a insulated standoff for attaching the ignitor wire to the start wire and used a machine screw, nut and lockwasher to attach it to a factory hole at the flange where the cowl meets the firewall, just above the heater duct. The material I used was a piece of 1/8 inch masonite, cut 1/2 inch wide x 1-1/2 inch long with two holes drilled in it. One for mounting at the cowl, and the other to accept a # 8 machine screw with flatwashers, lockwasher and nut to use for attaching the ring tongue terminals of the two wires.
Now it is necessary to make a new wire for connected the positive side of the coil to ground somewhere. I found a length of 14 gage wire with a properly sized ring tongue terminal already on one end for connecting to the coil. (I keep a large box of automotive wiring in the garage). I added a larger size terminal at the other end of the wire for connecting to the existing ground lug at the firewall, which is connected to the engine.
My rotor was in pretty bad shape. I used a small wire brush and crocus cloth to shine up the electrode which makes contact with the dizzy cap towers. The underside of the towers looked okay. Put the cap back on and it was finished. The engine started immediately on the first crank. I jumped out and checked the timing with an inductive timing light. She was right on the money.
The engine starts more quickly and runs as good as ever. The whole installation only took me about two hours and that was with the dizzy still in the engine. That time includes messing around making the little standoff bracket for the wires, hunting thru scraps of wire for a wire long enough for my ground connection, sifting thru my box of electric wiring accessories for suitable wire terminals AND getting all the tools put back away.
Tools I used: 5/16 wrench for removing wire from points, 3/8" nutdriver for removing coil wires, two straitblade screwdrivers, one long and one short for removal of points/condenser & installation of the ignitor, one piece of solid 22 gage pull/guide wire, jigsaw for cutting out masonite, stone grinder for grinding masonite corners smoothe and rounded, drill and 1/8 inch bit for drilling holes in masonite, one combination wire-stripper/snips and terminal crimper, 11/32 inch nutdriver for attaching standoff bracket to cowl and for connecting ignitor and "start" wires to the standoff.
