has anyone here used an aftermarket ignition boxes other than MSD. im on my second 6AL box and i think its starting to go on me. i was looking at the mallory and crane boxes. has anyone ever used them. do you like it better that MSD. will they work with all my other MSD ignition products. any help would be great. thanks alot

 

A lot of people complain about the MSD boxes but then there are the rest of us that have had them trouble free for years. Make sure it's isolated from heat, moisture and vibration. To answer your question though I think all the CD ignitions are the same. I've had a few customers' cars on the dyno and no one box made more power or ran smoother. Once you get out of the realm of stock ignition and into aftermarket goodies the gains between different brands will be minimal.

 

im not looking for power gains. i just want something that is more reliable than the MSD boxes.

 

Keep it mounted away from heat, moisture, and vibration and you wont have any reliability issues. Send it back to MSD and they'll fix it for around $60. Cheaper than buying a new one. They're all going to be the same.

 

that's a crappy deal where if their box breaks due to not being that great they charge you to fix their problems

 

just my 2c but would it be possible and a smart thing to do to mount the box in the passenger side dash where the ECM mounts??

 

Sorry,pal,but you got other problems.I'm not saying this because I love MSD products,but because the 6AL box I have now is 7 years old,and has been in at least 5 different vehicles,one of them being a class 4 mudracer.Your either getting it wet,overheating it,or your having ground problems.I've never known of anyone having trouble with them without it being user error.

 

I was kind of wondering the same myself. The Crane ignition system looks pretty appealing. No need for pills for rev limiters and couple other things...especially price. $180 @ Summit Racing for the box and external PS-91 coil vs $230 for the 6AL plus $45 or so for the coil. Looking for recommendations actually...

 

Also...has anyone ever tried mounting their box inside the compartment? I'm aware you always want the ignition as close as possible to the engine, but if you ran the wires to like the passenger side under the dash or on the console would it be alright? I know quite a few Mustang guys that run their boxes in their compartment.

 

well if you think about it its not too far from the dizzy to the dash and depending on how you run the wires (i would run them through the firewall right behind the dizzy) their shouldnt be any problem with excessive wire length.

 

here is a pic so you can see were i mounted it. its right above were the gas tank vent canister would be. all the wiring is right and it never got wet(the car was never in the rain and i only washed it twice this year), and i dont think that vibration is the problem here. as far as heat goes, its not really around any extreme heat. even if i mounted it inside the car i think it would see the same amount of heat that it would in the engine bay. if you think about it, im sure that the box creates heat all by itself, if it is mounted under the dash in a car with black interior on a hot summer day and the heat form the firewall, its going to get hot. im not going to send it back to MSD and pay $60 to get it fixed. id rather buy a new one from another company.

 

So basicly, what your saying is "dont mount it in your cars engine bay, and it will be reliable" ?

I've had MSD boxes for a long time. I've seen them last, I've seen them break.

I just recently switched to Mallory HyFire. I think i'm gonna give digital a try.

-- Joe

 

I need info on this too. I am up in the air about which to get. Crane or MSD. Price is not too big an issue, but I don't want to be overspending for no good reason. It is a street car, but is putting out 500 HP N/A out of a 385 so I kinda want to make sure the ignition is all set.


Hoping people say crane is OK, price is right.

 

there is a company that will take your MSD box and replace the most common components that go bad with newer, better ones for like $75 and with a warranty. My friend had an MSD box in his fox body, it died from heat and MSD wouldnt fix it. This company replaced the bad components and it has been working great ever since. I guess it's a real common problem with MSD boxes. I will try to get the info and post it

 

I have the HI-6 on the '57. Only reason is I got it for free when a bud cleaned out the basement when moving out of town.

Big downside is no provision for 2-step rev limiter.

 

Based on my experience with MSD, I find it very hard to believe that MSD wouldn't fix the box. I asked them about the cost to fix a 15 year old MSD 6A, and they replied that the worst case would be something like $60 or so, which would involve replacement of everything inside the box. The actual cost of repair was about $25.

 

how long does it take MSD to fix it.

 

i take it back, they wouldnt fix it under warranty, it would cost him $150 plus shipping. That is why he went to this other company, I will try to get the name and post it.

 

Your friend is feeding you a line. Like Aperion said the max they charge is around $60 to fix it and thats replacing everything. I've had my 6AL for 6 years now with no problems. Yeah, it's in my engine bay but it's away from heat, moisture and vibration. Under the dash is a good place to mount it if you've got room to hide it and enough air to keep it cool.

 

I had it back in something like 2 or 3 weeks.

 

I mounted mine this weekend where the ecm use to be...perfect spot for it....

 

Techwestracing.com check them out. They will do tons of work and improve the box, MSD will just replace the same old parts with the same old parts.

 

Do you have any pics of the install...I'm diein to see how it looks.

 

Ill take some this eve....

 

Allright well I am not going to be racing so I don't need anything that is overkill, I think I am just going to buy the crane cams fireball. 220 bucks.

For a street car, do you guys think that I need anything more? Like the timing retard or anything like that? There are so many different things available. Thanks guys.

 

Like I said I went with mallory. No issues so far. I think mallory is prolly a more reliable name in ignition than crane.

Then again, who knows.

-- Joe

 

I will look into it. I am going to be runing a mallory dist. So it might be worth sticking with the same comapny.

hmm.???

 

Why do you want the ignition box anyway?

 

Well a couple reasons....

1. They provide a rev limiter, so that if my foot slips I don't reve the engine to death.

2. Provides a more complete burn= more power and efficiency.

3. The abilitly to add other things later on down the road like timing retard from the driver seat and so on....

I believe that something for less than 300 bucks constitues the jobs it can do.

 

The rev limiter and retard features are useful, but you won't see any more power or efficiency on a street engine.

 

Well then for the first and last reasons. And I am sure it doesn't hurt efficiency so egh.....They advertise them as helping out with it, so I bet there must be some credibility to it.

Anyways, back on topic.


Are any boxes harder or easier to wire in? Don't they all wire to the same things? Has anyone actauly used the crane cams box? Mallory a lot on the street?