My poor Charger burned its ecu

[Ghoste]

Another Mopar box has bit the dust, this time a chrome one.  To make matters worse, it melted out the epoxy goo in the back and it ran down the firewall.  I put an orange one on that I had laying around but its on the way out too, at slow idle speed it stops.  Looks like its time to put my MSD back into service but you know this whole mess with poorly made ecu's from Chrysler is really maddening.  We can blame Mexican production or Chinese transistors or whatever but ultimately Chrysler is responsible for signing off on low quality.  If they insisted on good parts I would be out driving my car right now.

[JB400]

It used to be Chrysler was all about great performing parts, before they cheaped out like everyone else

The local dirt track seen the power of the chrome ecu Sat. night.  It took a 3rd place car and had it running up with the leader door to door as they took the checkered flag.

[Mike DC]

Here we go.


We will all switch to the aftermarket to deal with the junk Chrysler stuff.   

Eventually Chrysler will discontinue the part entirely. 

And when we complain, Chrysler will say, "There was no demand.  You guys just weren't buying them anymore."

[A383Wing]

I think I'm gonna go this route....even the MSD stuff is not found on every street corner auto parts store

http://www.designed2drive.com/

[Ghoste]

I'm going to use the MSD because I already have it.  And Mike, you're right but if they are only going to offer an inferior product then they have already discontinued it as far as I'm concerned.  That's how the market works.

[moparnation74]

I'm going to use the MSD because I already have it.  And Mike, you're right but if they are only going to offer an inferior product then they have already discontinued it as far as I'm concerned.  That's how the market works.

I Agree. Sorry to hear about that Ghoste

[ACUDANUT]

Maybe keep a points distributor as a spare ?

[Ghoste]

You know something, I did that for a long time in the last Charger. 

[polywideblock]

I scored a couple of these 'hi rev " units  from  R Ehrenberg  on ebay haven't missed a beat so far 

                          http://www.ebay.com/itm/MOPAR-Hi-Rev-ECU-Electronic-Ignition-Box-Control-Unit-Charger-Duster-340-440-/221536287949

                     

[8WHEELER]

I have only heard of a couple chrome boxes going bad, I am not saying they don't. I have been running them for 34 years, and never have
had one go out yet, and I am talking at least 100k miles not just to car shows, I raced the hell out of one cars. I did put a new one in four
years ago, but only because it was looking old, so I kept it.

I have mine mounted right to the firewall as well, just a lucky SOB IT SOUNDS LIKE..........

Dan

[Just 6T9 CHGR]

Shawn, have you tried to diag why these boxes are failing?  Properly grounded?  I too have been running a Chrome box I had for 10+ years...have an orange one also that I ran for 5 years prior (its my spare now)

[Ghoste]

No.  In the old car I had one fail due to a bad ground, another failed for reasons unknown.  I don't know why this one did, or even why it melted the epoxy out of it.
The orange one I sub'ed in there came from a guy who said works "kind of" and that seems to be what it does but no idea why.  Nacho had a good thread in the electric section.  He seemed to feel the transistor was the main culprit.  It appears the older boxes may have had selected transistors in them whereas the new ones are a batch buy.

[jaak]

Not trying to sound cheap, but I have had better luck with the Duralast ECU (Part # CR 109) from Autozone than MP ECU, out of 3 I have used on 2 different cars I had one go out, but they have a lifetime warranty... so AZ replaced it for free It's been going strong for almost 2 years now. Best thing they are 20 bucks. To me they last a lot longer than the Orange MP units, I had 2 of those fail fairly quickly.

Jason

[A383Wing]

I'm running a black ECU on one car, and a chrome unit on the other...I think both were aftermarket units from early 80's...no issues...so far

[Ghoste]

It seems like the last decade is when they went to crap.

[70-500-SE-EXPORT]

I scored a couple of these 'hi rev " units  from  R Ehrenberg  on ebay haven't missed a beat so far 

                          http://www.ebay.com/itm/MOPAR-Hi-Rev-ECU-Electronic-Ignition-Box-Control-Unit-Charger-Duster-340-440-/221536287949

                     

X2 this is the best box out there

[Pete in NH]

Here's what I know about Mopar Orange Boxes. I put one on my 71 about four years ago to replace a 30+ year-old Motorola electronic system. The Motorola box still worked fine but, the potting compound liquefied and ran out the back. These types of electronic automotive components are sealed in what is called potting compound. The stuff never really gets rock hard because you want a compound that will flex with temperature. A hard epoxy would expand with temperature and bust up the circuit boards. For some reason this potting compound becomes chemically unstable with time and starts turning to a liquid. I had an old Chrysler ECU on the shelf that was about 30 years old and never on a car, it too was turning to liquid goo.

The Orange Box on my 71 is clearly stamped as made in the USA and the transistor is clearly marked as an SG Thompson part, which is a European company and a quality transistor maker. I recently bought a spare because SG Thompson no longer makes these transistors and These ECU's will eventually disappear unless they are redesigned to use newer transistor packages. The second Orange Box was also marked made in USA with a SG Thompson transistor.

I think these boxes are often killed by poor grounds. I scraped the paint off around one of the mounting holes and ran a separate ground wire directly to the engine block. I used ring terminals and lock washers to ensure a good connection on both ends of the ground wire. So far, so good and I'm not expecting the box to fail but,time will tell.

[BrianShaughnessy]

Try using the MSD ballast resistor in the future...  .8 ohms.   Some of the resistors out there are .25 ohms which will just more likely burn up the box faster.

http://www.msdignition.com/Products/Coils/Accessories/8214_-_Coil_Ballast_Resistor_0_8_ohm.aspx

[pmike]

I ordered an orange mopar ecu from jegs couple of days ago. I currently have an old 5 pin ecu with two sided ballast, it works but I thought to change it to make sure it is not contributing in my exhaust firing troubles, and thought to get rid of the ballast alltogether to keep it stupid simple with less possibilities for bad connections.

So what is the wisdom about the ballast, it does not affect the power for the ecu but may could affect the ecu overheating or so via the coil? Would it be wise to still use one?

I guess I'll better keep the old ecu and ballast available in the car if the orange ones are known to burn then..   

[A383Wing]

the ballast is for the coil, not the ECU.....it knocks the "+" voltage down to around 9-10 volts

[ACUDANUT]

Not trying to sound cheap, but I have had better luck with the Duralast ECU (Part # CR 109) from Autozone than MP ECU, out of 3 I have used on 2 different cars I had one go out, but they have a lifetime warranty... so AZ replaced it for free It's been going strong for almost 2 years now. Best thing they are 20 bucks. To me they last a lot longer than the Orange MP units, I had 2 of those fail fairly quickly.

Jason

X2. 
Hell, buy a extra one and keep it in the glove box.

[Ghoste]

pmike, if you just bypass the ballast, it will be a coil that fails soon.  Best to leave it in there.

[lloyd3]

I know that the stock stuff has very few fans here, but the factory dual-point and all of the rest of the stocker stuff still being used in my car has never let me down over the last 18-years or so I've been driving it (yet, knock wood!).  And, I've put something like 30k miles on it so-far. FWIW: I believe I'm something like 8-years out from my last point and condenser change.

[TUFCAT]

I'm going with the Pertonix Ignitor III for my 383 build.  I can't tell you how well it works, but I've heard good things about the Pertronix II and III products, as well as the Flamethrower coil.  If it ever fails, you just replace the points and consdenser and get down the road.