Apparently that's what happened in the pits last week.

Pulled it off the trailer, double-checked the lash, put the Valve Covers back on went to fire it and...nothing.

they (+) and (-) straight wire to the battery and I got nothing to the Coil.

any other Ideas?

I heard there was a guy in NC that rebuilds/upgrades them, lost his number years ago because I guess I thought I had a good one.

Pat Collins, TechWest Racing.

Only time I've just had one die is from low battery voltage.

Usually, repeated cranking with a nearly dead battery will take out the 6A, 6AL, and or the coil....Somtimes the coil goes first and then the box, somtimes the box.

I had my coil swell up and quit before the box quit on the next fire up. I have had a couple of these boxes quit, and yet, my 7AL2 has been mercilessly cranked on a nearly dead battery, and no issues, coil or otherwise. And that has been in my street car since '96 when I bought it.

I have switched to Petronix and had no issues in my race car. Was tired of changing out boxes. I am also in the middle of changing out the one in my street car. I like all the features on the newer boxes so I have a 7AL just sitting here.

Short answer, yes - the old style 6A, separate limiter.
Out of maybe 5 of them so far, that's been the only one of mine, and happened maybe 10 years ago.
I sent it to TechWest and talked with the guy there, who repaired the unit - and it's worked fine ever since.
He told me it was due to resistance from a sideways-mounted oil-filled coil (426 Hemi), which was a Blaster2.
Apparently that kind of builds up until the MSD finally quits.
He recommended an epoxy coil, and turned me on to using the F-150 unit.
I've since used that coil on hot rod stuff several times with great results.

Yes, we have had dozens and dozens of defective boxes, distributors and EFI components fail. Send them back in to MSD and they mysteriously always check out good and MSD ships back at no charge... They fix whatever is wrong with it and send back claiming nothing was wrong with it so they don't get a bad reputation out in the field.

Yes, when they die they die. Send it back to MSD, they'll fix it for a fair price. Sometimes for free, sometimes they charge $40 or $50 bucks. We've sent a few back over the years.

Did you do a spark test by jumping the pickup wires? I always do that to test the box in a no spark situation.

The only time I have ever had a MSD box die was when someone hooked a battery charger up backwards years ago.

IIRC Frieburger broke a couple of 6 AL's on his '56 using solid core wires. I've never had any issues with MSD stuff and haven't heard of too many problems this side of the pond, we had a rash of counterfeit ones entering the market all bearing the same serial number a few years ago but heard nothing since.

Wow, ok Glad I'm not alone!

No this motor fires on the first crank and I always put a fresh charge overnight on the battery.

I guess it was just it's time..

Thanks!!

I had a MSD 7 die like that at the races, drove the car to the front of the starting lanes on Sunday morning at one of Mopar Races at the Track in Las Vegas, NV several years ago, I tried to start it up a couple of hours later to move it forward and no spark
MSD said they couldn't repair it as they had run out of that internal wiring harnesses for that unit
I should have fixed it myself, but I didn't try

Water will knock one out, my buddy washed my car, (box was mounted in the fresh air duct on firewall) only one in 40 years ever sent back MSD said there’s a safety fuse inside to protect the goodies. Also had the small coil on a 7 go bad to, it would spark once then nothing, changed coil and back in business. Make SURE the ground is perfect.

I had one that sort of died. Mine only acted up when the unit got warm, the engine temps and ambient didn't matter much. My issue started as a high speed miss, but only in the upper gears(car is a four spd) and progressed into an earlier and far more serious miss until it wouldn't rev much above idle regardless of temperature. I just bought a new one as they were pretty cheap back then.

I thought it was my magnetic pickup, but a couple minutes with a VOM eliminated that notion. I swapped my coil even though it too, measured good cold.

The new box immediately fired the car up and I drove it - open headers and slicks - onto the interstate and ran it through the gears. Fixed.

Its not uncommon that simply unplugging, removing, and plugging stuff back in is what actually fixes it.

A module failure itself is actually pretty rare. It's almost always the connection itself, grounds, etc... that are the problem.

It's step one taught to problem solving. Remove the part completely, and re install it. It seems dumb, but you would be SHOCKED how many times that fixes a problem like this.

Not to say stuff doesn't fail of course too.

Msd boxes need constant voltage coils, Oil filled oem is not! They need ballast resistors and won't work. How old is the box? I had an old one probably from the 80's. I took the back cover off and could see where the board and a few components where showing signs of heat. The box still worked! I think they have been working on the internal design since they first started making them. Wonder if they finally figured out a trouble free design?

Make sure the box has switched power, and your distributor is triggering it. You can test by grounding or jumping one of the trigger wires, theres instructions on MSD’s site.

Like Andy said you can send it back to MSD and they will diagnose it and tell you what it costs to fix but its really reasonable. I got one from a buddy that he fried somehow and it was around $80 with return shipping.

People are selling the old analog boxes cheap these days too, but they are surprisingly well built and MSD’s customer service is very good.

I got 2 reman'd by Holley's Tech Repair back around 2021.
It was about $85 a piece.
Toughest part was getting through the phone system to a live Technician.
But, service was excellent thereafter.
Both started dying intermittently, like they were overheating.
My theory is there's a big capacitor that is used to create the "Multiple discharge" affect and it eventually breaks down.
I still buy cores for $50 to send in.

Thanks for the tips guys!

Removing the battery cable while running and reattaching will take them out too.

The tech guy at the track switches my battery off and it is basically doing the same thing and my box is still doing good.

Gus

Then the MSD tech guy lied to me after mine failed doing this.

He switches it off then on while it is running?

Do you have the later MSD with the full time + and - wires?