twogees

Thanks- yea i did see that one but 30 bux w/shipping was a bit much for it i thought. for another 15 i could get a new one w keys just seein if someone has one on here first.

ok so i am an idiot and i drove off w/o my gas cap today. i would like to see if anyone has one laying around they'd like to sell. i'd take it with key or w/o. aslong as the cap is in unlock position. thanks-Ben

Anyone have any idea what this is? Please, I'm at a loss as to what that box is i haven't seen anyone else with any thing like that. t

crazy wiring. Trying to get a grip on what the PO has going on. i have a 79zx. my car was stripped down 2 years ago with the idea it was gonna get re wired and mS control spark. well that didn't happen and now my car has had to go from just a block to complete again in the last 2 weeks. i am anxious to drive it again but was left with a rats nest of wires and splices to make you cringe. Alot of stuff wasn't labeled for as i say i was planning on putting a whole new MS harness and get rid of the msd btm. most evrythign was obvious but theres a few things i cant get my finger on. Ive searched for ever for someone with a set up like mine and cant seem to come up with it. There's some transformer or whatever it is. I cant figure out what it is for the life of me. Here's a pic of the box i am talking about and the mess... the box is plugged directly to the btm by way of harness w purple,green wires. So there's the blue wire and a b/w switched power wire coming from the car. the blue wire t's off from car to one to the bottom left connection on the ?box. the other one to the dist. now the b/w wire branches off 4 ways,1- to the bottom right on the ?box..2- to switched power on the msd btm. 3- to the condenser thing then that is connected to the spade off the vac adv. 4-then turns into a brown wire and heads to the other spade on the dist. I don't have the factory plug so I need to make sure the blue and brown goes on the distributor ic unit on the right side. Now with the key on,and everything hooked up, i have switched power in the blue and b/w..Is that right? wires are going everywhere and i just need to redo this right once and for all and i need some insight please. im trying to get some signal to the msd and need to confirm i have this right. I also use the tach sig from the msd to control my inj in MS, so those arnt firing either till i get this figured out. Then i can gander that it is a bad dist.I hope that's all this is. It worked when i parked it but it fell one day and that must have broken it inside I'm guessing. The magnets are cracked and the continuity was changing when the red, green wires were jiggled, indicating possibility of a short from the pkup.Does all that sound right? im still learning and just trying to get a better understanding of whats going on with my particular car. It needs to be mobile asap. I don't have a working car and I'm moving very soon. thanks-ben

ok tried to bypass the msd just to see if i could get spark. No go. So my guess is the dist isn't sending a signal to the msd for fire,rpm. Did a resistance check between the two wires coming from the pkup in the dist to the ic unit and was getting varied readings depending how i moved the wire. does that mean there's a short in wire? took the magnet off and it was cracked in several places. i would hate to buy another dist to set it back up like this (i want to go edis) but im on a time crunch cause im moving in the next week or so and my car has to be mobile. does that sound like the culprit to you for lack of signal? should i upgrade to a turbo dist instead of another n/a dist. im gonna try to read more about it but i dont think i can make the switch happen in time.

i dont know if it matters but my fuel pump is not hooked through MS.theres no fidle wire. i dont have a stim board. only the middle led on MS comes on for a sec or two when i turn the key. when MS is open the rpm and inj plsewdth are in red. the MT version i have is 2.25b514 beta.

hey matt-yes i got the ms harness tach wire plugged directly into it .checked my power running from batt to msd box, switched power to the msd, then power and ground to coil. but no power to coil from msd with test light. but no rpm sig to MS either. Im not an expert or gotten real far yet but everything else seems to be reading that i can see tps, clt etc so i dont think (hope) my prob isn't anything on the MS side. where would the msd read rpm signal from. magnetic pickup? could there be a prob with that? but it should still at least get power to the coil i would think. man i hate wiring. :blink:

Ok, i didnt want to start a new thread, im having the same prob..my MS 1 v2.2 used to be hooked up and ran fine. just got the car hooked back up tonight after 2 years and im getting no rpm signal or inj pulse width readings. im only using ms for fuel. im using a non turbo dist msd btm and msd coil, the btm is run of a magnetic pkup. theres power going directly to the msd from the battery but theres no spark from coil , power to coil from msd or rpm signal.IM wondering if the msd went bad from sitting so long. now from reading this i now understand that with no rpm the injectors wont fire. IM getting power coming outta the injector resistor box to the injectors, the plugs smell of 0 fuel but theres definitely plenty of pressure at the rail. im itching to get this baby fired up and help or ideas is appreciated thanks-Ben

OK sorry for the stupidity in advance(no pun intended).... i thought i didn't want advance, since it is turbo? i thought i wanted it to retard, thats why i had the msd btm to retard (x) amount of timing per psi of boost? I should set what conservatively? the boost level? and by "pulling" timing under boost you mean pulling it advance or pulling it retard? yes i am a retard. lol. so what should i do now as a fix to this ? run a 82-83 dist w/o MS for now? or just stick w what i have til i can get MS/S working and controlling spark? basically any tuner should know what to do (if they are good)? yea it doesnt seem like i have been able to find anyone else running the same stuff i have like the pick up, dist i have, and btm. it must be an outdated way to run , but its what i have .no wonder ive been having trouble trying to figure this out.

heres the wire and capacitor hooked up to the vac part of the the dist i believe. heres the pick up connected to the msd

Gollum- thanks for the reply. OK that's what i thought. i figured, hell as long as i get a good tune done, then i figured the drop in comp should be ok. just wanted some confirmation.. I do like the idea of those pistons you described. i will try to look into that. the msd unit you posted the link for, is that the same/similar as the msd btm i have ? just with a rev limiter/2 step? give me a few mins and i will post some pics of the dist. my whole goal is eventually upgrade my M.S. to control spark(whole nother can of worms!!) then i wouldnt need to worry bout a dist if i go distributor less. Then I could get rid of the msd btm. I do know thats my weak link now(and most important go figure).. but with the power levels i would like to achieve right now in this car i thought it should fair well up to 300 hp or so( i just cant let my boat have more hp than my car)lol... plus i thought id keep it mild for now its a rust bucket. don't want it falling apart. i have no actual goal..what ever the car can run at w/o blowing up is what it ends up. there's no reason to blow it up from trying to boost beyond the cars means. Doesn't make sense.(i do have a bigger turbo and another block i plan to put in my other 280) I had looked into doing the crank trigger but the mods ive seen are for a pulley w/o A/c. I live in fl, there's no way im getting rid of that. my fuel side (knock on wood) should be good the MS was already programed for this setup already aside for lower comp, and i relocated the intake temp sensor to in front of the throttle body instead of in the air filter before the turbo. so its gonna need a tune for sure. I really plan on having it tuned as soon as i can get it to the dyno. im only waiting for $$ for head studs, a few bolts, odds n ends and i should hopefully have it running again very soon. So as far as the timing, now i should put the timing chain on crank and stock cam gear like normal, set dist at tdc aswell so timing is all at 0, but should i leave the BTM where it is, or should i make it 0 aswell to start out with?

brad- unfortunately i dont have spark control on the ms just fuel.I haven't gotten that far.this car was built in 05' im sure alot of things on it can be done differently. thats the stuff im trying to figure out. A more efficient way of running this car than previously setup. A lot needs to be redone..but for now i just need this car mobile..im moving in a few weeks, time is limited and i cant tow it everywhere.

my head is spinning... im still trying to get this car figured out..trying research to figure out exactly what i have and such but it is slow going process. i went back through the paper work and the receipt for the dist says 280zx dist w/ vacc advance not w/o. the wire leading to the vacc advance w/ the capacitor leading to the blk/white wire was hooked up so i would imagine it was working. the mechanical advance, i have to try and search for that cause i have no idea. as far as the timing i dont know what that was set at either. as far as what the timing was ..all i know is the msd was set between 2-3 on the retard dial and the dist was just about clocked all the way clock wise. it is still in the same position it was in when removed. i never did any timing readings in the short timee i had the car and it was running. im still trying to figure out timing and how to set it to get it running again with boost.

double check the size on the bung .. i know some factory narrow bands are smaller than the bosch for instance. it was like that on my old 240sx.