Im trying to wire a msd 6al box up on a 87 dakota but not sure what everyone is using for a source of a switch 12 volt.the book says to delete the ballast resister but i cant find one on it anywhere......

use the power wire to your coil.

there should be a blue wire that is hot with the key on.for your switched wire to the msd.i had to open up my harness on driver side to find it on my 88 dakota.i opened the harness up just past the firewall.

Make sure it's getting full 12V not reduced voltage in the ign2 "crank" brown wire circuit and in the ign1 "run" blue wire circuit. when adding MSD I'm not sure if you bypass the ballast on strickly the coil ign1 "run" blue wire circuit IF keeping the original coil. I think there was some good info posted on this awhile back. Anyone? Does your 87 dak have a regular type electronic ign (ECU/ballast/2 wire dist pickup)

Its a 1987 with a 3.9 v6 but im putting a 5.8 magnum in real soon.im sure its electronic ignition but i cant find no ballist resister.
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You DO NOT use a ballast resistor with any of the capacitative discharge boxes. There will be two wires coming out of the box that hook to the coil and those should be the only wires hooked to the coil.
If it's an MSD 6 you need two power wires, one big one from the battery or the battery side of the solenoid, and one from the ignition to actually turn on the unit.
BUT.....
I have a problem as I do not know if your distributor has advance or not. On many cars of that era the distributor is only to give reference points to the computer and to distribute the spark from coil to plug wire. So then you'd use the wires from the coil to trigger your MSD.

Either look up MSD on the Web and read through their instruction manual, or call them and ask directly. I think you're going to

I understand how to hook it up but the directions say to delete the ballast resister and there isnt one......

do you have an ECU and a 2 wire pickup dist?

there is no ballast resistor. and there is no advance mechanism on any magnum distributor. 12v to the msd and you will need an aftermarket or early distributor if you are changing it to carb. all the advance in the magnums comes from the ecu, and the ecu may not like the msd. id call msd and get their recommendations.