Airjockie Posted May 22, 2008 Share Posted May 22, 2008 sparkless.....until I toss in a new coil... situation... Coils are dead in a few laps around the block. car... 260Z with half a 280z harness and the rest are mixed parts. symptom's... car runs fine, then dies. Replace coil, and car run's fine...but AAA towing is called for later on in the day. Engine... F54 block, P90 head, 40 webers, pertronix pickups in a 280z dizzy, Allison igniter box thingy, but I think it's an old ZR700 crane cams box, piggy backing on the stock 76 280 transistor..... harness... front half from seats forward are 280Z, seats back are 260Z. Dash... 280 dash swapped in place of 260Z. ECU...280Z new parts to install....said coil, MSD 6A, but leary to drive car anymore in fear new coil will blow.... Possible Remedy...just swap in 280ZX turbo engine with a Z31 turbo ecu system onto an 83 280ZXT harness, which was powering a 76 turbo 280Z with a Haltech in the 260Z?.... anyone else just putting along and have a coil blow on them? have you had a transistor go bad before, or a wire crossed and the coil heats up and looses it's conductivity? I'm automobile savvy, and I've never had coil's blows like this.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Airjockie Posted May 22, 2008 Author Share Posted May 22, 2008 30 minutes at idle, the coil is to hot to touch.... something is not right. But it run's and sounds great, but how long it will run is a huge question. and the dependability in my book is too questionable.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SHO-Z Posted May 22, 2008 Share Posted May 22, 2008 Are you running a ballast resistor? My 260 has one next to the coil. It drops the voltage to 9 volts to the coil. Also check your ground Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clifton Posted May 22, 2008 Share Posted May 22, 2008 You don't need the resistor with the msd. I ran a 6al with just a stock elec dist and never had a problem. Maybe it's the allison ignitor thing? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedEvilrps13 Posted May 22, 2008 Share Posted May 22, 2008 hey airjockie! it almost seems like whatever it is that sends the power to the coil is sending too much..... ...maybe the old transistor is finally giving up the goose? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Airjockie Posted May 30, 2008 Author Share Posted May 30, 2008 progress.... I started hooking up a used MSD 6A, got to the point to where I needed a signal for it to fire...so I'm going to bypass all the old incar transitors and relays, and try to hook it directly up to the old dizzy, that has an old XR700 optical sensor already installed and the points removed. It was the dizzy that was running previously in the car with the Alison box, which is just the older version of the crane cams XR700. No pertronix stuff anywhere. So now to hook it up...the optical sensor just didn't have the juice to signal the MDS (I think), and how I would hook it up... I've got the two wires for the magnectic pick up from the MSD and I want to try to wire it into the ZR700 optical sensor. I do have have what looks to be a ZXT dizzy, but I'd like to keep the oil pump on for now....unless I have no other options. The old Dizzy with the XR700 optical sensor.... three wires coming out... white, black, and silver. I hooked the MSD mag pick up wires as such: Violet to black, and green to white....and all that happened was a constant spark....while the engine was cranking... coil wire removed... coil wire installed, and it wouldn't kick over unless I touched the wires intermitiantly... I know the MSD work....I had a huge jolt for about 3 seconds and my arm still hurts the next day. The spare dizzy... it looks like an optical sensor as well, but with 4 wires, instead of the 3 on the old one...and if I can't get the msd to use the old 3 wire dizzy, how can the 4 wire dizzy hook up and get used? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naviathan Posted May 30, 2008 Share Posted May 30, 2008 This might help: Courtesy of mobythevan and the Megasquirt thread you might use this diagram for the pin out of the 4 wires. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clifton Posted May 30, 2008 Share Posted May 30, 2008 With sds I use the white. When I was running off the stock elc dist, I used the purple/green wire on msd. My dist had two pickups. If you have 4 wires, it sounds like you have two pickups also. You only need two wires from one of them. Make sure you don't use one wire from each or it won't work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naviathan Posted May 30, 2008 Share Posted May 30, 2008 With sds I use the white. When I was running off the stock elc dist, I used the purple/green wire on msd. My dist had two pickups. If you have 4 wires, it sounds like you have two pickups also. You only need two wires from one of them. Make sure you don't use one wire from each or it won't work. His dist is not a dual pickup like the 280Z, it's an optical from a turbo. He showed a pic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clifton Posted May 30, 2008 Share Posted May 30, 2008 His dist is not a dual pickup like the 280Z, it's an optical from a turbo. He showed a pic. Oops. I thought I was looking at a Pertronix pickup in pic two and stock mag pick up type in pic three. I would think, if the Pertronix can fire a coil same as points, you can use it on the white wire. I would use the wire coming off the dist that changes on a ohm meter when spun. You can't use them all on the msd (mag and point input) I have called MSD in the past and they have pretty gfood tech guys. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Airjockie Posted June 2, 2008 Author Share Posted June 2, 2008 welp...now I'm, screwed. I was playing around with it today, pulled up an actual wire dai, and went to work trying different things... and two wire rested next to each other...and the next thing I know...there is a poof of smoking coming from the dizzy cap. I fried the crane cams optical sensor... so now I have to either pop off the oil pump, change the dizzy shaft and start playing with the ZXT dizzy and start re-wiring everything again... or find a dizzy that slips right onto the 280Z engine and is MSD trigger happy. Third option is to just give up on the car for the summer, and set it aside for a full winter rebuild. I got 3 other cars to play with... an 87 CRX, another 260Z, and an 88 200sx... anyone have something cheap that will work...I'll have a decent paycheck thursday. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naviathan Posted June 2, 2008 Share Posted June 2, 2008 Use the turbo optical dizzy and reference the wiring diagram from the MS forum to get it wired up right. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Airjockie Posted June 2, 2008 Author Share Posted June 2, 2008 well, the spare dizzy I have has red, green, white, and black wires.... the MS list's b/w, gb, gy, and black.... but I'll try to figure it out. also, I searched, found once on the quick way to pull the pump and align the dizzy shaft and oil pump, but now I can't find that write up... back to searching. Does the oil pump also needs to be swapped? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naviathan Posted June 2, 2008 Share Posted June 2, 2008 No, the pumps are virtually the same. The turbo pump is just higher volume. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Airjockie Posted June 18, 2008 Author Share Posted June 18, 2008 about to hook it up today, and I don't want to pop anything...what I am thinking, is this wire arrangement. Black-ground red-acc fuse green-msd white wire? white-not used? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mobythevan Posted June 18, 2008 Share Posted June 18, 2008 well, the spare dizzy I have has red, green, white, and black wires.... the MS list's b/w, gb, gy, and black.... but I'll try to figure it out. You mean like this(from the megasquirt installation sticky): DIZZY WIRE COLORS!!! if you use the wire at the dizzy, versus after the 4 pin round connector: Dizzy side ------------ Harness Side Red (12v) B/W White (MS trigger) G/B Green (not used) G/Y Black (gnd) Black Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
primadonna z Posted June 18, 2008 Share Posted June 18, 2008 Are you running a ballast resistor? My 260 has one next to the coil. It drops the voltage to 9 volts to the coil. Also check your ground I'm with Sho-Z I think that your running constant 12V to a coil that does not have an internal resistor. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Airjockie Posted June 19, 2008 Author Share Posted June 19, 2008 I'm giving up....for now. I connected everything up, and I guess the dizzy doesn't have enough juice to trigger the msd. I'm just going to yank the carbs, exhaust, and header off the car, and sell them. Then pull the motor out and everything else off the car and prep it for a major over haul in the winter. Time to invest into the painless wire kit, and find a guy to sandblast the shell. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mobythevan Posted June 19, 2008 Share Posted June 19, 2008 You installed a 1K resistor like the schematic above shows? You need the resistor or it won't trigger anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Airjockie Posted June 20, 2008 Author Share Posted June 20, 2008 I just tried the resistor...and no change. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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