MSD yay or nay

Do you like MSD products?

  • yes

    Votes: 42 72.4%

  • no

    Votes: 16 27.6%
  • Total voters
    58
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I have one car with a complete MSD system, but as mentioned earlier it is an older 6AL analog box. Over 20 years, I had it die once. Good news is if you want MSD and don't want the new digital stuff, you can find an old box and ship it to MSD and they will completely rebuild it for a reasonable price. When mine died, I sent it and two swap meet 6AL boxes and they rebuilt all three. The extra two have been gathering dust ever since (five years).

I also sent a Mopar distributor to FBO and they recurved it and sent it back with a new ECU that they sell. Best part of their ECU is an adjustable rev limiter that is part of the ECU and a test light to determine if it has failed.

My third car has an older MP distributor and orange box that I sent to HalifaxHops. He tested it all made necessary repairs, recurved the distributor to match what I told him about my intended us and tested the ECU.
 
No problems with my MSD, most of the problems are caused by installation errors.
 
Icetech said:
Depends... do you enjoy putting on a one man car show on the side of the road? Then MSD is for you :)

P.S. i should clarify though.. i have used their boxes and stuff in the past without issue. but like full ignition on a street care i need to depend on.. never will happen.. too many friends did it and ended up needing to be saved. I have also used a stock setup (excpet on my new setup which will be pertronix which is making me nervous already)
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It's happened to my friends too. I ran one on a Chebby back in the late 90's and realized it's just a gimmick when it didn't really improve performance.
I just run an Orange box in all of my Mopars. I think one or two may have Chrome with rev limiters but basicly all stock performance style.
 
MSD I think, stands for
Multi-Strike-Discharge
Which it does to 3000rpm IIRC. After that it is just a
CDI, a Capacitor Discharge Ignition.
If you have a street engine with a big messy cam, yes it can help in the messy zone. But once the revs are up, any old ignition will work, the higher the amperage the better, and the CDI systems are often lacking in amperage, especially the E-cores.
You just can't beat a high-amperage coil on a capacitor, triggerred by whatever, but I personally like the no-maintenance magnetic hall-effect trigger.
The biggest cam I have run is the old Mopar 292/292/108. I cleaned up the carb, and never needed more than the Accell square-top big yellow SuperCoil, running at ~8.5 volts. I triggered it with the Factory Pick-up, amped up by the Orange box.
That cam didn't like 3.55s much, which is all I wanted to run; yes bad marriage, but I was young then, and so out it came..
Sometime after I switched cams, I decided I wanted a Dial-back timing module, and chose a Jacobs unit. Simultaneously, I installed a Jacobs Ignition CDI unit with a Jacobs E-core coil, which promptly left me stranded. Thankfully, the old ignition system was still under the hood, and before too long I was rolling again.
I shipped the Jacobs Amp back to them and they sent me a replacement ......... which is still in the shipping box that it came to me in. I had enough of Multi-striking.
Except for the above incident, that Accell has been under the hood since year 1999, and thru 3 cams, and three compression ratios always at between 177>192 psi CCP.
It's staying.
The system is still wired like factory, except on relays. During cranking it gets Full Battery voltage just like stock. In run, it goes thru the Accell-recommended ballast-resistor.
BTW
The Jacobs Dial back Module is still working flawlessly as are the Jacob's wires. They're staying too.
I installed the Jacob's E-core temporarily for testing, and it works fine. So if anyone wants the Two-pieces Jacob's Multi-strike CDI stuff,
Oh I forgot the point!
The point is that if my junk runs fine with the Accell coil and no Multi-Strike....... I suppose any streeter with a 292 or less cam, will also run fine when equipped the same.
BTW-2
If yur running an Orange box or similar Factory amp, then your car will run fine on any old factory amp substituted in, to get you home, just make sure the case is grounded. So then, you see a Volare/Aspen in the parking lot?...... No-No; just throw any known to be working, spare, in the trunk. Yes even one off a slanty. Throw a regulator in there too. and some new alternator brushes.
 
On the analog side I have used MSD for street/strip home garage builds (10-11 seconds cars) to utilize MSD plug and play Rev and 2 step launch control with good results. On mild street cars I used the orange box. Again with good results. The belief being the more complexity built in the ignition box? The more likely something fails. And being the street/drag cars are not driven as much on total mileage. MSD (including their distributors) work well.

My first venture to a digital system for a higher power pro street build I'm using SEFI "Big Stuff" engine management module. This of course is managing more than just ignition. EFI as well.

Anyways, that's my meeger experience, thus yes. I like MSD AL option.
 
Currently have an analog 6A on my Dart. If it dies, it's getting swapped for a crank fired coil on plug system.
 
Yay. All older stuff and I used the MSD7 box on the street never had an issue. Not a gimmick. Please don't touch anything with the 7. I think you could weld with this thing.
 
Far from just a gimmick go to the track and see what guy/gals who race are using I'll bet 9 of of 10 cars are using MSD!!
 
I like the Pertronix Digital HP CD box. I installed one in my truck about a year ago and it's held up great (overkill for current engine but I do plan to upgrade). It's physically much smaller than the typical MSD box but comes with adjustable 3-step rev limiter and keeps multi-spark all the way to redline instead of reverting to single-spark above 3500 rpm or whatever like an MSD. Price is pretty good too for what you get.
PerTronix 510 Digital HP Ignition Box Black Anodized Finish
 
My Demon came with one and after about a month of owning it the Msd box died. I swapped it back to Mopar stuff and had no issues. I will say that starting with the Msd was much faster than the Mopar stuff. It just fired immediately.
 
rumblefish360 said:
That’s what happened every time I put in a MSD - THEN…..

It died on me. Each and everyone of them except my first one which is still in use but owned by someone else. But me s skip the one and only one that has actually worked as intended and kept on going for decades now and let’s talk about the 12 or 13 others that have died on me and there supposedly rebuilt replacements that MSD sent me under warranty.

They all died. Some within minutes, non lasted more than a month. They all died!

M may
S suddenly
D die

It’s no joke. That’s what they do! Each and every 6 & 6A box has crapped the bed in me.

Each and every replacement 6 or 6A box crapped the bed on me.

Go to 4secondsflat.com and ask them for there bad *** ignition set up and be happy instead of one day replying to a thread like this and writing what I wrote about warning people about being test another sucker purchasing a made in China crap box.

Yep! You read that right! MSD farms out there work to the Chinks.

As said above, ether find yourself a old hood American made ignition box by;

MoPar - Crane - Mallory (before MSD purchased them up and destroyed them) OR

Got to 4secondsflat.com and grab one of there boxes made in America.

MSD is ****… repeat after me, MSD is ****, MSD is ****, MSD is ****, come on now, keep going until you run out of breath…
MSD is ****, MSD is ****, MSD is ****, MSD is ****….
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Maybe you shoulda upgraded to a 6al
 
MSD are badass try to get a older model, but they do die my died after a year, but my buddies has been going for over 8 years? I would run another but have a dummy plug and play harness so if it goes out I can just run my mopar Ecu box
 
People that have the old Crane box seem to love them....no longer available.
People that have old Mallory box (pre msd) seem to love them ....no longer available. (Me)
MSD more or less dominates the market for high end ignition, whether deserved or not.
I had forgotten about ICE, and pertronix struck me as a cheap points replacement fix. Their plant is just a few miles from my house, their digital box might be worth a try, if either of my 6AL's fail. My 30 year old reman Mallory box is bulletproof.
 
Brooks James said:
Maybe you shoulda upgraded to a 6al
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Sorry, perhaps I did t make my self clear. I have own almost only 6A boxes. A singular 6 box. All but 1 and only 1 box worked more than a month. All replacement boxes by and through MSD were worse.

I hope that clears that up.

I do have an older ability MSD 7 series box that I’ll try out at a later date. I hope it works since it was a used unit.
Fingers crossed!!!
 
I'm amazed I never hear Aqua Pulser mentioned in conversations like these. I played with their PDI ignition on 2 separate vehicles. Based on my experience, I'd recommend it for a race car or occasional driver over anything else. However, on my daily driver, I couldn't keep spark plugs in it for more than 3k miles! I even tried the Brisk aircraft style ($18 each) plugs -- no outer electrode to melt off! The Aqua Pulser spark was so intense, that it eventually arced through the ceramic. But holy sheets can you feel the difference! I never felt much difference with MSD.
AquaPulserSpark.png
 
I never tried Jacobs. I bought Dr. Jacobs' Ignition Book, though (come to think of it, I haven't seen that thing in about 15 years). I questioned a few of his theories back then. Since then I've learned a bunch. Maybe I'd judge his counsel a bit differently now.
 
I teach Fuel Efficiency classes. I filmed the 1st one-day class. Below is a link to Ignition Segment 2 of 3; it's about 40 minutes long (the entire Class comes in around 7 hours & 11 minutes). I don't even mention MSD (or similar products), but instead focus on something called Peaking Caps. I don't share this freely on YouTube (which is why it's just a link to my Cloud), but am offering it for free to my FABO friends.

 
Thanks Mike.

I myself did make a leap and tried a Jacobs unit some years ago.
The model was their “Pro Street” unit. It also had the EZ hook up. Typical peripheral aftermarket ignition wiring hook up. Plus one more for the OE coil to trigger the system.

I used it on an old Hyundai Excel 4 banger with a manual transmission. The spark energy was very strong. The distributor cap would give way after about a year. When I took the cap off, the material resembled burnt/charged wood.

Mileage went from 38 to 42 mpg Hwy.
I don’t remember off hand what I opened the plug gap to. I do remember experimenting with it though knowing power/mileage was there to be found.

The system worked flawlessly. I still have it and I will see if it’s still working soon. I have his book as well. It was a little over my head at the time. Like yourself, perhaps a revisit is in order.

The book and ignition modules can be found on EBay.
 
mpgmike said:
I'm amazed I never hear Aqua Pulser mentioned in conversations like these. I played with their PDI ignition on 2 separate vehicles. Based on my experience, I'd recommend it for a race car or occasional driver over anything else. However, on my daily driver, I couldn't keep spark plugs in it for more than 3k miles! I even tried the Brisk aircraft style ($18 each) plugs -- no outer electrode to melt off! The Aqua Pulser spark was so intense, that it eventually arced through the ceramic. But holy sheets can you feel the difference! I never felt much difference with MSD.
View attachment 1716064069
Click to expand...
But those pictures are a bullshit comparison already. Nobody's stone stock ignition is as weak and lame as the spark on the right. Nobody's......not unless there's something WRONG. So why in the world would I believe the picture on the left? Even a lawnmower mag fires a plug hotter than the picture on the right.
 
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And how much of a spark does it take to light the fire?
 
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