Yea, that'll do it. Even though it's ground wire, if you ground it to the frame, it'll also kill the ignition. Learned that the hard way with a grounded out tach wire passing thru the firewall, "way back when" Everytime I'd go to shift (4 speed Toploader) the motor would go dead til I let off the clutch. I had passed the tach wire (which connects to the negative side of the coil) thru the clutch rod hole.
But are you sure it's alright to replace the resistor wire with a normal wire? I haven't had time to check where it ends up under the dash, so I was kinda worried I would fry something by giving it 12v when it's supposed to run on 6v Also.. What's this and what's the point of it? It's connected to the negative side of the coil:
The white ceramic block with two wires ? That's a resistor also. I ran one with the Pertronix in my 89 Ranger when I did a V8 swap. Use what Pertronix recommends (voltage and resistor )with the module. It should also be connected to the positive side of the coil, not the negative.
Yeah, that's what I found weird about it.. The fact that it was connected to the negative side that is..
This has been bugging me for a couple days now, it's actually called a ballast resistor. It's been some time since I fooled with that setup, but for some reason resistor by itself didn't seem quite right.
That ballast resistor is to reduce the voltage to 8 volts when running, so points don't burn out. I believe Petronix requires a full 12 volts. Just remember the coil grounds through the distributor, so with a negative ground battery, the negative post goes to the distributor.
So the resistor is only there to reduce voltage for the points? In other words, replacing the resistor wire with just a normal type wire would work?
Use what Pertronix recommends.That should be listed in the instructions. I used one (a ballast resistor)with both the Pertronix I & II and with the Crane XR-1. Yours may be different, I don't know. It's been several years since I used both Pertronix units.
I think thats a first. Never seen someone wire a ballast resistor to the neg. side of the coil. They belong in the glove box of an old Mopar. Actually got a call at work for one a few weeks back. Our parts guy still remembered the number. Chrysler still had them at the depot. LOL.
I feel there's a lot of half-assed work on the car, wiring is especially crummy.. I guess the previous owner just put the wires in the wrong place? I mean, what good would the ballast resistor do on the negative side?
