any year 74 to 85.doesnt matter if its 302 or 400.around 86 ford went with efi and didnt use a vacuum advance anymore.

 

I have several 70-80's vans & trucks with the DII. They all have a different color code to match the engine size. Does anybody know what the differences are? I have a 300 I6, 302, 351W and 460.

The Mopar conversion for a FLATHEAD is in Aussie Mike Davidsons book available at Speedway, Amazon, etc. I havent found the Y block version yet, Ive got to get this place organized when it gets too cold to play outside.

 

286merc,

As far as I know, the differences between the distributors of a 302, a 351W and 460, are the shaft and gear. The internal parts should be the same. The I6 has another difference yet. The armature has 6 blades instead of 8.
A friend of mine brought me his distributor to convert to duraspark a few weeks ago. Since November and early December is a very busy time for me, I can't even think about stepping inside the garage. But I hope to get it done soon, and this time I'll take pictures and explain how it is done. I even borrowed a camera already.
As soon as I finish it, I'll let you know.

Best regards,
Lucas (Lobo)

 

Lucas, Im referring to the electronics module.

 

I'm sorry... I guess I misunderstood your question.
The most common module, that will work on just about every vehicle, is the one with the blue grommet.
The other colors I don't really know what they mean.
I know the yellow one is for high altitude/emissions applications, and have an extra set of connectors.
Take a look at this web site. I think it has some good information about the application of these modules.

http://home.earthlink.net/~bubbaf250/parts/parts07.html

Best regards,
Lucas (Lobo)

 

Lobo, Perhaps when you get the write up done again it can be made a sticky, or bettere yet you can submit it to Ken as a Tech article write up for him to post?

Im interested too, and have posted about it before with replies from you, but I dont think you were the one that emailed me.

 

I am looking for info on converting y block dist to Duraspark. Do you have any notes or photos. Thanks

 

For '57 and newer distributors, go to the junkyard and get a duraspark distributor to use as a donor. For the '54-'56 distributors, I can't help you.

If you have an autolite distributor, you will have to have the points cam machined to accept the reluctor (the thing right in the center with 8 arms sticking out). You'll have to modify the body for the magnetic pickup's wire grommet, easily done, carefully, with a dremel. Everything else should drop right in.

If you have a motorcraft distributor, all of the parts will drop in with the exception of the wire grommet, you'll still need to make that modification. You can also swap all of the Motorcraft Y-Block stuff into the Duraspark body. It's more labor intensive, but no modification is required.

It's really pretty simple. When you have both distributors in hand you can see what needs to be done.

It all just barely fits:



Once this is done, you can use it to trigger virtually any aftermarket box, or use a stock duraspark box.

If you feel so inclined, you should think about recurving the distributor while you make the conversion. For the Motorcraft, it's a piece of cake. The mechanisms have numbers stamped on them, often 13L and 18L. Every advance unit will have two, I believe another is 12L and 15L. That corresponds to the number of distributor degrees of advance it will provide, double it for crank degrees. You will notice that there is a slot by each number and that slot engages a stop, you should see this when you take it apart. The engaged slot is the one limiting the advance. So the 18L slot equals aproximately 36 degrees of advance at the crank, the 13L slot is about 26 degrees, etc. You want about 24 - 26 degrees provided by the distributor, coming in by 3000rpm - you'll probably need to get a spring kit to achieve this - and about 12 - 14 degrees initial. Of course, if you get any pinging adjust as necessary. Every engine is different, but this is a good starting point.

You can adjust the curve of the Autolite but it requires brazing or grinding to change the amount of advance.

 

I still run the original '54 239-y, 0.30 over. installed a '55 merc. hex drive dizzy and oil pump, converted points to pertronix a couple of years back and man is the idle smooth and level...very pleased with results.
Ed