Can someone tell me what the wires on both the + and - posts on my coil go to? I know the one black wire on the + side goes to my distributor and I think the other black one on the + side goes to the ignition.
But the - side is what I'm unsure about. I have two connectors on the - side with one of the connectors having 2 cloth braided or covered wires going to it. What are they for? The other wire is black and goes to a ballast type unit at the base of the coil. What is this thing? Looks like a mini-coil or something? A buddy mentioned something about a tachometer wire possibly being one of these wires. Can someone help identify them for me?

Thanks,



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Scott Wolfe
Leck Kill, Pa.
70 Chevelle SS L34

Scott, If you are correct in your description of the wires on your dist, It looks like they are backwards. The wire to the dist should be on the - side and the wires that have the cloth covering on them should be on the + side as these wires supply the power to the coil, yes the engine will run with the wires this way, but not right and the tach, if you have one, should go on the - side of the coil. If you indeed have a ballast resistor mounted and wired into the system, it shouldn't really need one, the cloth covered wire is a resistor wire and should drop the voltage to around 9 volts. John Muha can verify the wire colors for you, I am not up on that part.

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Leo Paugh
Maryland Chevelle Club #017
A.C.E.S.#3731
progress has little to do with speed, but lots to do with direction.
Maryland Chevelle Club (http://www.chevelles.net/mcc/mcc.htm)

Looks like Leo pretty much has it covered, I just wanted to say maybe the part in question is a condenser ?

Does it look like a small metal can with a wire coming out of one end ?

Also it would help if the type of vehicle was posted with theese questions

Leo,
No wonder I'm having so much trouble trying to get this Pertronix ignition to fire up! I rehooked up everything as it was on the old coil. So the black wire that was on the + terminal that is the ignition switch wire should actually go to the - side and the cloth wires should go to the +? Is that small unit with a single black wire mounted at the back of the coil a ballast resistor?
And should it be wired to the + as well?
Thanks,

Scott

The small unit on the back of the coil is probably a noise suppressor to cut down on Ignition noise. Did the Pertronix unit come with directions?

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Leo Paugh
Maryland Chevelle Club #017
A.C.E.S.#3731
progress has little to do with speed, but lots to do with direction.
Maryland Chevelle Club (http://www.chevelles.net/mcc/mcc.htm)

Dean,
I thought my signature covered that but it's a 70 SS L34 which is the 396(402) with 350hp. And yes, it's a can shaped item with one wire coming out. Does it need to be wired to the + or - side of the coil?

Thanks,

Scott

Pertronix ignition wires up a little different for best results. Check out this thread that I and John Z discussed it.
http://www.camaros.net/forum/Forum10/HTML/001530.html