Good evening , guys.

I'm ( hopefully ) going to be ordering a new distributor tomorrow , but still have a few questions that the Mallory tech rep wasn't sure about today. So , I'm wondering if any of you have installed this distributor in your car , and could resolve these last few concerns I have.

Again , it's a Mallory 5764501 -( 57 series magnetic breakerless , with the tach drive. )

Here's a link for more info on it , in case your running a Mallory , but don't offhand remember the part number of it. Look familiar?

http://store.summitracing.com/partde...0&autoview=sku


1.) Will this distributor fit under the shielding doghouse? No issues with diameter and height? I can never figure out why a tech rep doesn't have access to some engineering blueprints and be able to provide some accurate dimensions , instead of saying " it doesn't look too big , it should fit" ( It could be helpful if the picture had some relative reference next to the distributor , like say , a couple of cans of Bud stacked up. Oh wait , I have a couple of those cans here now , but the picture of the dizzy looks a lot smaller than even one of the cans. Dam , I suppose now I have to worry that the unit will just fall down the manifold distributor hole. )

2.) With the vacuum can oriented in the normal position , what direction does the tach drive coupler end up pointing to? Again , from the pic , it looks like it going to end up in front of the dist. , and pointing off toward #5 or #7. So here again , I'm concerned about fit to the doghouse , and cable routing and clearance.

3.) What was the gear to housing end-play clearance out of the box? Since it's a .491 dia. shaft ( score one for the tech rep - maybe ), shim kits with an assortment of thicknesses seem to be extinct in that diameter size , and that would be another problem if the play runs much over .010 .

Hope you guys can help me out with this. And if you have any pics of this installed , that would be really great.

Thanks.

David

 

I used to run a dual point Mallory. It appears the case is the same size, and mine fit fine under the shielding.

It looks like that dist. is set up about like stock. The vacuum pointing towards the right front tire and the tach drive pointing straight back at the firewall (OK, maybe slightly toward the driver). You shouldn't have a problem with the shielding. The toughest part is routing the tach cable so that the last part aligns straight into the tach. They usually come out of the firewall and form an "S" with the last part of the S almost touching the firewall before going into the tach.

Good luck

 

Thanks , Z-man.

You're right about the tach cable curve , and I always wondered why the drive output wasn't designed to allow the cable to run more parallel to the firewall.

 

I've seen some 90 degree fittings that are supposed to help, but I always wondered if it was just something else to break...

 

I have one that I got from MidAmerica a few years ago and haven't had any problems with it.

 

Check out Lars' paper on distributor installation. It includes information from a Chevrolet Service Bulletin issued in the 70s that called for installing the distributor so the vacuum advance was pointing to the back of the passenger side valve cover. This allowed the tach cable to run very close to parallel to the firewall. The Service Bulletin was issued to resolve tach cable issues.

 

Put your distributor where it works best with the tach cable.
As per the recomendation above you still have plenty of + - wiggle room for timing....

 

Thanks to all of you for your input here. My biggest concern was for the fit under the doghouse , and after checking the Mallory site for the dual-point , it seems that both units use a YL bowl. So it should fit as per Z-man's prior experience.

The info about the 90* adapter and altering the installed vacuum can position is appreciated. At present , the existing cable casing curvature has acquired " memory" , and the cable still spins smoothly, so until a new cable is required , I guess I'll just lube it and reinstall in it's usual position.

The service bulletin info gives me a laugh , because I can just picture the design engineer pondering the fix ( )for an issue that you would think would have been addressed before the final distributor production design was set. The part of this I find hilarious , is that the 50's and 60's were definitely an era when all the sheetmetal on the steel bodied cars was changed every year.

Now I wonder if that old engineer is still alive and kickin' , and what he'd think about me laughing at his work.


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