Ceramic resistor

[bacarudaguy]

So I'm in the final stages of cleaning up/rewiring my engine bay wiring after a fusible link meltdown and I've come across something questioning. When I rebuilt the car, I put the ceramic resistor back in that's in the ignition circuit. According to my wiring diagram, it's powered off the ignition switch and is in-line to the ignition coil and alternator regulator.

I've got an MSD 6AL on the car, so my question is, do I still need that resistor. The coil has been upgraded to a 40,000 volt coil and the regulator was replaced with an OEM style... I don't honestly see the need for it, but I don't want to pull it and cut some wires out if it's going to hurt something.

Thoughts?...

[dave kanofsky]

I'd suggest call MSD and see what they say. I'm sure you're not the first to use their system in an old Mope.

[bacarudaguy]

Thanks Dave! Maybe I'll try to give them a call tomorrow...

[Super43]

Mike, not that I know for sure.. but I ran the MSD 6a on the superbird... and it still had the resistor.. put on 15 to 20,000 miles. I originally put on the MSD to clean up emmisions at idle, but it made that 440 a super starting motor, if it would turn... it would start.

[bacarudaguy]

Hey Bruce!

Did a little testing last night and that resister is a MUST. Car fired up with it, shut it down and pulled it out. Car would fire for a revolution then die. No matter how many times I tried, it wouldn't run without it in. Good to know as a little added security at cruise nights. Not to mention the ignition cutoff switch I have. Slowly getting back into the swing of the car world down here... and I thought it would get hot at shows up there. Whew!

[furious70]

As the OEM wiring is done you need it to complete the circuit but a 'race' (not OEM direct replacement) coil and MSD6A do not want it in the system. They will run on the 9v, but they would rather have the 12v. I eliminated the ballast resistor in the Fury when I went to EFI and my super coil and MSD6a loved it. If you read the 6a manual you'll see the same thing.

[bacarudaguy]

So what'd you end up doing with the 2 connections for the resistor? Can I just hack the connections off and splice them together?

[furious70]

Since I went efi and single wire alternator my harness is quite different now. For your car I wouldn't cut the harness, I would make jumpers to connect them together.

[bacarudaguy]

Furious - what a difference! Fired the car up in the garage without the resistor (made a jumper) and she sounded even healthier then with it in... thanks for the tip. Found my manual and it said not to run it... dunno how I missed that the first time...

[furious70]

Looks like you used the exact jumper I did when I first tried this before rebuilding the harness. I found a premade one in my toolbox, I'm guessing it actually was in the MSD box for this purpose.