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Spitfire educate me on spitfire distributors

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frankenstang57

frankenstang57

Jedi Warrior
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So, I have a good 1500 I'm planning on installing in my MKI. The motor is out of a '76 and has electronic ignition. The distributor has 3 wires coming out of and no tach drive. I'm looking at another distributor for sale online that is reported to be out of a '76 as well. It has a tach drive and no big box on the outside. Which is the proper dizzy? Can I use one out of an 1147 Herald motor? I'm planning on ditching the points and installing an Ignitor. Any inputs? Thanx! :jester:
 
Short answer, I believe is yes.
 
frankenstang57 said:
So, I have a good 1500 I'm planning on installing in my MKI....I'm looking at another distributor for sale online that is reported to be out of a '76 as well. It has a tach drive and no big box on the outside. Which is the proper dizzy?
Click to expand...
I'm pretty sure that all Spitfires had electronic tachometers by 1975, so while that online distributor might most recently have come out of a '76, it probably didn't originally!
frankenstang57 said:
Can I use one out of an 1147 Herald motor? I'm planning on ditching the points and installing an Ignitor.
Click to expand...
I don't see any reason why not, although you'd likely want to look into changing advance weights and/or whatever else to best suit the engine it'll drive. Seems to me there's still a lot of reconfiguration possibilities with those Lucas distributors.
 
Thanx guys!
 
frankenstang57 said:
The distributor has 3 wires coming out of and no tach drive. I'm looking at another distributor for sale online that is reported to be out of a '76 as well. It has a tach drive and no big box on the outside. Which is the proper dizzy?
Click to expand...
If its a federal '76, the first dizzy would be the one. Should be a 45DE4 as per the attached, with the square amplifier box attached on the vacuum unit (note vacuum retard for '76, not advance).

Check for wobble in the shaft. If the bearings are good and the shaft doesn't wobble, that 45DE4 is a good distributor. The Lucas electronics have got a bit of a bad (undeserved IMO) rep. If you do have problems with the Lucas electronics, the Ignitor is a good way to go.
 

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I have one of those in my collection. It looks like the lucas died at some point because it has a crane ignition stuck to it.
 
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From Ebay for $7.XX plus $20 shipping. I want keep it simple since it's only a temporary swap! Thanx for the input!
 
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