Quote: The reluctor in our MP distributor already had two grooves machined in it from the factory. DRAM explained to me how to check the phasing, using the hole in cap and timing light trick. It was definitely off on the 383 in our RR. I had removed it to change the pickup coil. I then switched the reluctor to the other slot and it was spot on and the car definitely runs smoother now. The difference was clear, both visually using the timing light and how well the car ran. It was not hard to do, you just need an old distributor cap to sacrifice. It explained the wear on one side of the terminal inside the old distributor cap, instead of the nice even wear shown in the first post.
If you have a MP distributor pull the rotor and look carefully, to see if it has two grooves. If the phasing is off try the other slot before doing anything more elaborate, you might get lucky.
Mopar reluctors have 2 keyway slots, one is exactly under a reluctor tooth and should say or have a CW rotation arrow on top of the reluctor, this is the LA side. Flip it over and you should see a CCW arrow or CCW pointing at the other slot that is about a slot width off the tooth (to the left of the tooth looking down with the off center slot at 12 o'clock) during production, they might have installed the "universal" reluctor in the wrong position depending on the model of distributor. As for no other manufacturer addressing this problem, MSD has a 2 part rotor that has the ability to adjust rotor tip position a few degrees either way. They also have a super duper distributor that can adjust every reluctors position. Dont know if it is as offset reluctors or what but I did read it in a press release. FBO states many stock Mopar distributors are as much as 20 degrees out, that is half the distance between contacts!
