Pertronix Ignitor III problems

[RealWing]

Installed  Ignitor III (p/n 71385) and 0.32 Ohms coil (p/n 44011) on my Superbird 440-6 dual point distributor. This unit is specifically made for the Prestolite DP distributors and triggers off of the stock cam lobes. Seemed like a good design with multi spark and rev limiter. However I encountered a random misfire when starting and when engine was running. It was especially bad on a hot restart. The ignition would randomly fire well before TDC and completely stall the engine while starting!!!! Inspection of the unit showed that the rotating plate (holding the module) was loose. The plate could be moved up and down enough that the module could pivot up and touch the cam lobes in the worst case. Found excessive clearance at the 3 plastic clips under the plate. From an engineering perspective, the design/manufacture tolerances are far too large. 
​We reinstalled the original dual points and the engine starts and runs fine!!! The unit is completely unusable for this application - beware.
I have raised a warranty support ticket with Pertronix, so will see what they say.
Jim
​

[62 Max]

Never a fan of changing things that work. I've had my bird since 1982,still running the Prestolite,works flawlessly  and could never see any need to change as to the way the car is driven but that's just me. 

[Kowal]

On various other Mopar forums there have been discussions about putting Pertronix stuff on a dual point...misfires, etc.

I had a pertronix on my Hemi when I originally got it in 2012 and ran with it for a while, it used a converted single point distributor.    It was admittedly the basic unit, but I thought it was just "OK".    Switched to the tried and true Mopar electronic ignition set up with a hidden ECU, I am much happier with it.    I know the distributor isn't "right", but I do drive it so I think running well means a lot.

I would be curious to hear what others have done with Pertronix and on what distributors.

[Alaskan_TA]

My Petronix failed after about 1500 miles, so switched to a NOS Mopar electronic unit.

About 1000 miles after that their Flamethrower coil failed.

50 year old original coil back in, works awesome.

New is not always 'better'. 

[billssuperbird]

Mine works for a couple years really good and then had a problem went with MSD much better performance

[hemi68charger]

I have a Ignitor II in my Prestolite dual-point in my 426 Hemi coupled with a MSD-6A and it has performed flawlessly... This does remind me I do need to put a OEM points distributor in the trunk "just in case"..

[fastmark]

I bought one and it failed to even fire. I called them and they sent another one and it worked fine. Mine was a single point and I think it was too far away from the lobes to work. I changed out two of the mopar ecu with electronic units for the PerTronix ll  and they seem to work better. I've had lots of trouble with mopar ecu over the years. I've had MSD that work good but they go out as well. Have to carry a spare if you are traveling. I was having timing issues with a customers 440 Charger. He has an older mopar ecu with the orange box. He bought it new in 2001 so it should have been a good one. He's put zero miles on the car because of gas tank issues and a bad stumble. He finally took it out of long time storage and let me work on it. I fixed lots of problems from the storage to get back to the stumble problem. Short story was distributor had too much advance built and erratic timing and weak spark. Bought a complete distributor package from FBO Systems and it made a huge difference! I run more initial timing with less total advance so it fixed the low end stumble and it does not ping at power now. Timing does not jump all over the place and the spark signal through my inductive pickup timing light is much better and is rock solid and not jumping all over the place. I'm impressed. Car runs better than it ever has. Customer is going to be very pleased. If we could still get good gas, things may be different. I like the high output ECU.

[DAY CLONA]

I have a Ignitor II in my Prestolite dual-point in my 426 Hemi coupled with a MSD-6A and it has performed flawlessly... This does remind me I do need to put a OEM points distributor in the trunk "just in case"..

Same here, been using Pertronix conversion kits since about 1990 on my personal and customers marine/Industrial/automotive applications, Zero failures, Zero issues.....I've done just about every application they offer including fork trucks(tow motors), Industrial generators, etc, etc as well as the customary automotive applications, units 1 thru 3...


Mike

[ODZKing]

I tried the first gen Pertronix way back and had it on my 67 for a total of 30 minutes tops. First off it screwed up my factory tach which was enough for me. It came off, got sent back (returned) and I went with the Mopar set up as Kowal did. Quite happy and works just fine.

[billssuperbird]

I think I will put a spare MSD box in to.    what do you guys think about a MSD 6400 t6 brand new in the box for $80.00 good deal or not

[krops cars]

I work in the forklift industry. Pertronix is junk to me.

[DAY CLONA]

I work in the forklift industry. Pertronix is junk to me.

"Funny" that you say that, my first experience with a Pertronix kit was installing it in one of our shops fork trucks/tow motors, a 1954 Clark Car Lift back around 1989/1990, (it was getting harder to find points/condensers/caps) that same tow motor/fork truck is STILL running the Pertronix I installed back then, we have one other tow, a Hyster that has been running the same Pertronix since about 1995...ZERO issues/failures  

[krops cars]

We have some good one's. We have also had where the engine will have miss fires and some have low power. If you can't get parts for them then I guess you have to do what you have to.

[RealWing]

Pertronix offered to take back the unit under warranty , inspect it and send me another one if found "defective". Unless they have redesigned the unit, that is absolutely no help since another one will have the same issues. Plus my expense of sending it across the border and back.
I bought the unit on Amazon.ca, but they have a 21 day return policy and I'm beyond that in trying to figure out what was wrong.
Looks like I'm out $273.18 CAD for the module and coil (which is no use to me since it is a very low resistance coil)
Very expensive and frustrating experiment!! I'm done with Pertronix!!!

Don't get caught like I did.
Jim