2 Questions

[Don Strausburg]

Can someone give me the pros and cons of changing my 1964 327 300 hp from points to electronic ignition. Performance, starting, etc. Second question - While driving my 64 this morning I smelled a sweet smell like coolant. When I got home I noticed that I had a little coolant on the shifting console. Not alot, just a little. Any ideas where it is coming from ? Tanks for any help.:bash

 

[JohnZ]

Don -

The only benefit to changing out the points to one of the drop-in conversions (Pertronix, Breakerless SE, Crane, etc.) is that you won't have to set dwell once a year or change points every couple of years. They also give zero warning of failure, and when they die, they leave you on the side of the road awaiting a mail-order replacement, as none of them are sold in retail stores.

If you have the unmistakeable sweet smell of anti-freeze inside the car, the heater core has failed, and pooled coolant is dribbling out of the bottom of the inside heater case. Time to replace the heater core.

 

[Don Strausburg]

Thanks for info

Thanks for the info I asked for. Sounds like I'm better off just leaving the points in. I'll take it in this week to have a new heater core put in. I think it would be to big and messy of a job for me to try it.

 

[Bob Willis]

I was having trouble firing the gas they sell in my part of the world, so I added a MSD unit (hidden under the dash). The car runs great now and if it dies I can just switch the wires back to the stock locations and drive home .

Bob

 

[Viet Nam Vett]

Don -

The only benefit to changing out the points to one of the drop-in conversions (Pertronix, Breakerless SE, Crane, etc.) is that you won't have to set dwell once a year or change points every couple of years. They also give zero warning of failure, and when they die, they leave you on the side of the road awaiting a mail-order replacement, as none of them are sold in retail stores.

If you have the unmistakeable sweet smell of anti-freeze inside the car, the heater core has failed, and pooled coolant is dribbling out of the bottom of the inside heater case. Time to replace the heater core.

As Mr "Z" has stated, they will leave you on the side of the raod ..but in my case it wasn't waiting for a replacement part but "AAA". It was 13 degrees outside on an empty road with no store to wait in to get warm.

Luckily I had my cell phone to call. "AAA" was 10 min from where I broke down but it took them 1 1/2 hours to arrive for the 45 min tow home.

Stick with your points..the GM engineer's new what they were doing back in the day. Not to say that the electronic ignitions suck.... as long as you have a spare with you your ok.

That is if you don't mind changing out a module in 13 degree weather.

 

[Newton]

There's a reason the race car guys all have two MSD units in the car. Everyone I know has had a failure at one time or another with the MSD units.

The other problem is that you're modifying an icon - and for no good reason. Think about it.

Richard Newton

Corvette Restoration Guide: 1963-1967

Ultimate Garage Handbook