I have had great success with the pertronix, 40k coil, 8 mm wire and E3 spark plugs.

 

so I was all set to order the pertronix and was talking to my old man about it and he said don't do it that back in the day he did it to a 2 cars and the were nothing but a hassle and he'd rather change out the point every 15k miles.... does anyone who does this have any issues are these kits better than they were in the mid to late late 70s? He was a mechanic at a ford dealer back in the 70s then a mechanic for the FBI so I tend to take his advice on alot of this but he also hasn't done this sorta thing in a long time so maybe the parts are better?

 

I put it on my 69 back in 97 and haven't touched them sense. I put on my sons 69 2 years ago and haven't touched it sense.

 

In 2004, I installed pertronix in two 1963 Galaxie 500XL's with 390's and a 1962 Studebaker GT Hawk w/a 289. Never had a problem.

The thing is, pertronix replaces both the points and the condenser. Most auto parts condensers are crap, because they are made in China, so can fail in a NY minute!

 

Points and condenser will work just fine IF you use quality parts like Motorcraft or NOS, not the drug store $&it sold today at the parts stores; and IF the distributor itself isn't worn out. It's true the import condensers are all junk but, so are the contact points.

Points of course are a mechanical system and consequently won't tolerate excessive clearance or wear in the distributor, seen as wobble and end shaft play, you'll go nuts trying to adjust them if the distributor is high mileage. A clean tight distributor runs noticeably better regardless of what's installed in there. Very often overlooked.

 

Two different types of V8 point plates. Thru 1971, there's an upper and a lower plate.

1972: Ford obsoleted the two plates, replaced them with a 'one piece' design (D2PZ-12151-A / Motorcraft DB-187-A).

But what Ford actually did was: Un-replaceable nylon bushings were sandwiched between upper & lower plates, then the two plates were pressed together forming a one piece assembly.

So...when the nylon bushings crack (typical), the point plates wobble, so you have to replace the plate.

 

2X. Among other points here he brought up the points being made in China junk also. This is one Good point I have not brought up in the past. And I should have. Points are made out of metal. There's different quality in metal. And there is spring steel that closes the points. Cheaper points will have a weaker spring. So the points won't close when they should. As fast as they should.

 

The contact points themselves were probably made of tungsten or some other alloy that was suitable for this purpose. Old beer cans don't qualify.

The rubbing block too, needs to be made of good stuff. Normally it will wear down slightly in the very first 50 miles say, and need another dwell adjustment and then will settle down after that for the duration. And that's if the mechanic remembers to apply a little bit of cam grease. The el-cheapo points on the other hand, their rubbing block wears down and just keeps wearing down to a nub. It seems to me, if ya wanna run points and condenser for whatever reason, purchase a set that was actually manufactured back when they were still being used in daily drivers, and consequently were also expected to work. They made a gazillion of them in the 50s and 60s and they are still around. Even the remanufactured distributors ship with these crappy offshore parts, and all the chain stores have to know they are selling defective junk points and condensers by now.

Bill brought up a good point (heh) about the breaker plate design too, the entire distributor and all its functions are very important to a smooth running engine that has crisp power and best economy and the rest of it, because it is the "brains" of the ignition system. It has to be able to not only advance the timing but also retard the timing smoothly on a constant and repeated basis for thousands of miles both mechanically (with weights and springs) and also the breaker plate and through the vacuum advance diaphragm.

Charlie was saying he does not believe there is any difference between Pertronix and a serviceable distributor running a points and condenser. I might quibble a little bit on that but overall he's undoubtedly correct. A worn out clapped out distributor won't run points well, but drop a module in and it will show a noticeable improvement. The module doesn't care about shaft sideplay or wobble the way points do.

But, a worn out distributor will still usually show erratic or sticky advance and other problems, like an intermittent miss at idle. I've also been meaning to setup a ceramic ballast resistor and install it on the firewall, and the associated wiring, to be able to quickly convert back to points and condenser if the Pertronix were to fail someday on the road. The "pink wire" is long bypassed, so being able to quickly swap over without crawling under the dash would be sweet. Almost 20 years with no problems with Ignitor 1 though. Y blocks have the distributor at the back of the motor, not particularly convenient to setup. If it were to take a crap I'd probably not buy another one I dunno. I like the idea of backwards compatibility and redundancy.

 

Actually, with some body work skills and some F500-up donor truck front fenders, I think you could modify and graft them together to have a bump line that would exactly match the line down the bed.

You can see the contour on the front fender of this Bumpside F600.



...and on this Bumpside big truck.

 

Ok well sounds like it's a good idea to do a full tune up since it's new to me I am going with the pextronix kit, the 40000 coil, new plugs, wires, cap and rotor.

 

Also I'm going to order up some drop beams ... what size king pins are in the 350 I'm assuming 1.25 but want to make sure.

Also front fenders came in today!

 

Please let us know how you make out with the beams (brand) and your king pin size. I have a 350 I plan to get a set for but not until next years tax check. this year is dedicated for exhua$t.
thanx

 

Well I decided to start on the suspension. I ordered some aim beams which should be in next week and in the mean time got the bed off and notched the frame. I still need to grind down the welds and get it looking good and add a cross member. I gave it a pretty good notch in case I wanna go lower or air. Right now I'm just flipping the axle, should be 5-6" drop in the rear. I did get the axle flipped but didn't take a picture as I got distracted cutting off the bracket that holds the carrier bearing (need to shorten). Will also need to make orbuy some shock mounts.

 

Very interesting build. I saw the Chebby fenders, but agree, the body line does match pretty well. I've seen some generic dually fenders put on these trucks but not sure where they came from. Likely aftermarket back when these trucks were much newer.

 

Well I got the front dropped in time for the show after labor day, and had a blast that weekend. The truck ran great only problem I had was half way on the way up I pulled into the rest stop and turned off the truck and it wouldn't start (hot starter?) but got a push and pop started it.