I took my Mallory Unilite electronic distributor out , pulled out the plate with the electronic conversion, then removed the plate with the advance stop arms and pulled out the weights and springs.

I did mark the distributor housing in reference to the intake manifold AND the rotor to the distributor housing so I'd have a chance to get it back in correctly . It seems NOT to be back in correctly and I do know now to get the engine to TDC on !#1 and get it re-indexed (though it's a PITA to loosen the plugs and remove the rocker arm cover).

ANYWAY...

Am I correct in assuming that the only thing that indexes the brass shaft that the rotor is keyed to mount to, is the small steel tab and the single screw that holds the tab to the advance stop plate ? (Mine has two adjustable arms...one for the easy-to-stretch spring (low RPM) and one for the stiffer spring (high RPM).)

Needless to say the engine is not timed at all correctly and I'm trying to determine where I went south.

Interesting once I was in there. SOMETHING had caused the plastic bushing that surrounds the wire access hole to melt and turn into a sticky gel, which seeped down into the bottom of the distributor and onto the weights and springs.

Thanks
John

 

OK...got it running, now I don't have enough advance at higher revs... I'm trying to limit the total advance so I can bump the initial up in the 20 deg range per Lars advice.

Now I know why there were distributor machines back then! This is going to get old really quickly

John

 

do you have a copy of the instructions for the distributor, if not they are on the Mallory web site.

 

Yes, I snagged those. The instructions are ... kind of an overview at best. There's no drawing of the internals and neither of the drawings of the advance limiting features looks like the one I have. There's no description of which weight goes on which post (I don't think this matters) or which spring goes on which weight (this may or may not matter if the weights are of different mass).

Given that this is 2nd hand, I don't have any docs other than what is on the web.

Anyone know?

I guess I can take them back out and weigh them. At least I'll know whether it makes a difference or not

John

 

I would be concerned about the melted grommet.did you check for any bear wires .most likely the unilite would not work if there was a short .didn't the unilite have weight stops that you set with a special key ?could you post some close up picks ?