Does my ignition still require the ballast with out the use of points?

[8v-of-fury]

I have heard the ballasts or just resistors were used back in the day to save points from seeing the full 12v and ruining them.

When I did my lean burn delete, I got a normal electric distributor with the orange spark box which were both brand new through Summit Racing.

My question, is why did I have to install a ballast resistor inline of the coil? Why can the coil not just receive 12v?

 

[kkritsilas]

The coil impedence is too low without the ballast resistor. Being so low, it will pull more current than the orange box can comfortably handle, and the coil will heat up. How long it will take to damage one or the other is unknown, but they will at sometime overheat and fail.

It is actually the low coil resistance that is the problem. You put the ballast coil in series with the coil to increase the coil resistance. And yes, you can buy coils with enough resistance that you don't need a ballast resistor.

 

[8v-of-fury]

Ahh, I see. It is the spark-brain that cannot handle the extra juice. Got it! It's no power house, so extra spark is not a concern. Most every place stocks these ballasts still.. so I am not too worried about that either hah.

Thanks Kkritsilas!

 

[80mirada]

The ICU sees a full 12 volts, it is the coil that requires the resistor, otherwise it lets out the magic smoke, learned from experience. Some coils require a different resistance and there are some that can run at a full 12 volts. Running with out a resister in line can improve spark marginally, but the coil wont last, it will burn out in a hurry (magic smoke).

Modern cars use Computer controls use coil drivers so they can optimize the power applied to the coils for long life and optimum performance.

 

[BudW]

The ignition coils do not run at 12 volts, on purpose.

You can get a much hotter spark if you decreased the resistance in ballast resistor – but doing so WILL shorten the lifespan of the coil.

Some drag racers do just that, but also have 5-10 ignition coils in tool box for they will go through one or two coils in a race meet.
I can see why they are doing it, but I think reliability is more far more important than ET (but again, I don’t drag race – so don’t listen to me).


Side note: most of our year cars will crank off at a lower battery voltage than other makes of the same year – because of that resistor. So if you barley have enough left in the battery to crank it, then you still got a good chance it could start. Other brands will crank only, until dead battery.

BudW

 

[8v-of-fury]

Good show lads! Thanks for the good brain-thinking .

It totally makes sense, I should have actually went with a pertronix ignitor III when i did the Lean Burn delete.

 

[BudW]

I should have actually went with a pertronix ignitor III when i did the Lean Burn delete.

It is a good system and have friends using it without any issues.

The only draw back I see, is if you are on the road, car breaks down somewhere late on or a weekend – then finding replacement parts can be hard to find.

I hadn't seen this happen yet – but is one of those storm clouds I see over the horizon (probably nothing to worry about . . .).