At one time, the orange ign. control units was not good. I need to buy a couple for backups/replacements, how good are they now?

Who stocks them? Mancini and ???

I heard the newer orange ones are worse than the older ones (& the older ones were so so), reliable somewhat but reportedly pulled timing. (electronically delayed opening the coil pri at higher speeds in effect retarding (pulling) timing). Not sure if I want to go with a pricey FBO ECU but most parts house ones are made in china tho I have used em (standard motor products) & no problems so far. Best would be to go with an HEI chebby module/full 12V E coil. EDIT If I wanted a ECU I would get an OE 4 pinner at a yard or a 5 if you are OK with running a dual ballast.

My two cent? Throw that MoPar ECU as far as you can throw it. They have been inadequate since first introduced and have gotten worse. I put an MSD in my AAR many years ago. The problem with that is that it is too big and looks out of place. So mine is under the rear package tray. It’s a pain to install and when it went out, after 15 years of reliable service, I had to crawl back inside the trunk. Still the best spark, though.

So my latest advice to my customers is go with the Petronix II and flamethrower coil. I’ve install both the one for the point distributor and electronic distributor. The electronic is the easiest and fits the best. It has one wire to each side of the coil and bypass the troublesome ballast resistor. My last customer came in needing a motor job and complete wiring harness. He wanted to make do with an orange box he had until he could afford all of the wiring. We removed the MSD on the firewall and put on orange box and a year one electronic four pin resistor that he had already. From the onset, the orange box would not start consistently. He had some bad wiring that added to the problem. I just finished the car this weekend with the Petronix unit. Car starts perfect and runs better. The first thing I noticed when delivering it was how much smoother the motor sounded. He noticed it as well. Cost? $110 plus the coil and takes about 1 1/2 hrs to install. It’s easy and cheap to carry a spare unit as well if it does go out.

I bought an electronic ignition conversion kit from Summit for my 68 383.
It came with an orange box and not sure who is Summit's supplier.
I have no issues with it and not "pulling" timing away.
I bought a pile of ECU's that came from Mancini's and they are perfect.
ECU's from AutoZone,Napa I had no issues,but their dwell curves are pretty much bone stock and not as agressive as the Mancini boxes.
Hope this helps

Having been placed to the side of the road twice with MSD products riding with my son on Drag Week not a big fan. Failures on my racecar as well.

Certainly seen the Mopar ECUs fail also, but as easy as they are to change I would run one to make sure its good then get another and run it. This way you know you have a good spare.

I'm with Rapid & 340 on this one. I run a MSD, but I had good luck with the stock ECU's and the orange one I ran. For spares, I suggest you test them like 340Cuda says and throw a couple boneyard ones (per Rapid) in the trunk after they've been tested. You can buy different ignitions which are better, but if you're already wired up for a factory-style box, then all you need is a screwdriver (or wrench) to change one...I'd go that way....2 screws, one plug

My 'inadequate since first introduced' system has served me well for over 20 years...

I just put together a factory ecu with a old nos gm 4 pin module hid inside. It did bump my total timing from 36 to about 40 degrees without me touching the distributor. And had to adjust the idle mix some. After about 100 miles on it I would say its better than a mopar ecu.

I have no doubt of that. I’ve had many fail as well. This is like the classic debat about green cars. You either love em or hate em. I considered the one called a Revanator that is advertised on this site but I still don’t like that big orange box on the firewall of a nicely restored car.

Paint is purely subjective...

(Although the 'green curse' observation has been out there for a long time...


Chrysler 'electronic ignition'................


The OEM installation can be improved upon...


Failures we've seen, by and large, are due to inadequate grounding, and occasionally, a wiring issue...


Today, I think I'd be more concerned about the 'imported' components, than I would be the system itself...

Get an old Mopar ECU, which color is irrelevant. Torch or scoop the silicon jelly out of it and rip most of the circuitboard out, except for the connector and pins on the inside.
Install/fix a 4-pin HEI module inside and wire it to the original connector pins.
Make sure the HEI module connects properly (use heat paste) to the aluminium cooling unit.
Discard ballast resistor, retime distributor and drive off.


Or looky here;
https://www.forabodiesonly.com/mopar/threads/hei-in-mopar-ecu-casing.252705/

It works. I am running a msd blaster 2 8202 not a e coil and the coil does not get hot. I did run a 25 plus year old orange box with the ballast bypassed and that same coil got hotter. That 4 pin gm module added almost 4 degrees at full advance on a timing light with no vacume advance.

I have these things that range from 5 to 44 years old and every single one of them works. From Factory ones to whoever made the electronic ignition conversion kits for Mopar: zero issues.

I have got failures with MP chrome box ( 3 of them in 2 years or so ), the old FBO A688 box, and a friend of mine with MP orange boxes. I made to fix the MP Chrome boxes replacing the power transistor. So my guess is the low quality components available on the market even being installed from manufacturer.

As mentioned, I made to fix one chromed box with a cheap ( and actually not the correct one ) transistor found locally, the CLOSER to the original specs I could find, but juts last long couple of weeks. Pretty much the replacement piece is also a cheap chinesse copy too. BUT found a REAL NOS OLD transistor in Germany ( MJ10012 on ebay ) made by MOTOROLA, not the later ones labeled ON... I'm still waiting to get my car on the road again to test it.

My friend with the Orange boxes found it seems some boxes got a chassis ground problem on printed circuit board, so he added a wire from there, where supposelly is chassis grounded straight from the PCB to the mounting bolt and got to make them work. Not all of them thought

I'm already running a Rev-N-Nator anyway.

Have tested the HiRev7500 box sold by Rick Erehnberg on ebay, and worked nice for me but a buddy of mine got it running a month or so. In my case is/will be my trunk spare piece.

So... its a lottery. But I think if money is not a big deal, the Rev-N-Nator is the way to go. True when I got it was a release price of $100 now is more expensive, but is a later version. I think it got some internals upgrades. Mine is the #20 from the manufacturer per the serial number.

If you are not on perfeormance ECU boxes deal, it seems the Standard LX100 and 101 are pieces that works nicelly and cheap enough to don't care get couple of them at the same time, for spare.

Nacho, how do you remove the potting to replace the transistor?

I just cut the area where the legs are solded into the PCB...

I have the pic around. Will edit and post this reply when I find it.

I in fact disassembled completelly ANOTHER unit, to test EVERY component one by one, to find EVERYONE was perfect but just the power transistor went bad. That was the one I made the first test with the closer transistor I found Locally to the right one and get success fixing iot, although temporally

This was with the Chromed ECU, which the back filler is more like a rubber so was easy to cut it... Some other fillers are more like a jelly stuff

EDITING:
didn't find the old pics but since the ECU with the real NOS Motorola transistor is still in hands, just took new pics. The black gaffer tape is temporal. Once tested, will fill it back with black silicone.

There is a thread I made long time ago at DC.com board showing the fix and test procedure on the first box, but pics were lost due an old imageshack breakdown ( closed free accounts ). I know still have the pics on my PC but couldn't find them yet.

this is the thread... trying to find the pics yet. I know have them because searching for another ones couple of weeks ago found those, but lost them again LOL

http://www.dodgecharger.com/forum/index.php?topic=92253.0;all

As you can read on that thread, I fixed both using same Transistor, One completelly dissasembled, the other one with just the pot filler cut. The one I pictured above is the second one with the NOS Transistor already installed, not anymore the one I used to check.

Here is another HEI option with way less work:



http://www.designed2drive.com/

found the pics... here are just some of the unit completelly dissasembled just to check the internal components were good or bad... all tested good.

reassembled with the cheap transistor found locally at an electronic supplier shop, closer on specs available out of the shelf, and worked

Great thread and very timely for me, thanks.

I am currently starting to resurrect my old 79 Power Wagon and the wiring looks like a mess.

It has sat for quite a few years and the black stuff in the back of the three boxes has melted and ran down the firewall.

Regulator, Ignition box and not sure what the small box is over on the inner fender?