Our first electronic ignition was a Crane/Allison unit. While washing the engine one day I got water into the remote amplifier module (apparently its potting material had cracked and let water in) which killed the electronics. I replaced the Crane unit with Pertronix which is all under the dizzy cap and therefore better protected. That was at least 10 years ago and we have had no problems. The Crane unit had been working fine until I soaked it so it is fair to say it is also a good ignition system.
While I have not had any problems with the Pertronix I have worked with them enough to pass along a warning. The original Pertronix design is sometimes referred to as "Ignitor-1". It is the most common. With Ignitor-1 you must NOT turn on the ignition and leave the engine NOT running for more than about 3 minutes. The Ignitor-1 module can overheat if coil current is flowing through it 100% of the time. I've seen numbers quoted at anywhere from 30 seconds to 5 minutes. A long time ago I called their tech support line to get their comments. I was advised 3 minutes was the safe cutoff. Keep that in mind should you ever be working on the car and have need to power the ignition system with the engine off. There is a tremendously easy work around. If you need the ignition on and engine off, simply unplug the Pertronix red wire on coil (+) until you need to power the ignition system.
That's more information than you wanted but it's my experience in a nutshell. I have had no problems with the Pertronix in our GT6 and prefer it to the Crane/Allison unit for its concealed mounting.
Doug L.
--Previous Message--
: Thanks for the tip. I do enjoy futzing
: with points, but there is the practical
: side of things. How long have you used
: the Petronix? Super reliable?
:
Responses