Mopar Performance electronic ign. woes

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Longgone

Longgone

John/68 Barracuda & Dart
Joined
Jul 12, 2005
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Newport News, Virginia
I`m installing a new Mopar performance ignition conversion kit on my 68 383. No spark? There`s 6.5 volts to the coil and resistor but no fire from the coil or plugs. The module is grounded.Any ideas?
 
Kinda sounds like a bad module. Do you have an auto parts store nearby that can test it for you. Most auto supplies do it for free. Sorry to say but I've sure heard alot about bad orange boxes. My conversion kit had a bad box the first go round. It ran but misfired terrible.
 
Thanks fishy68 ,I`ve heard a lot of bad things about Mopar`s orange boxes and I mail ordered the kit.I hope it`s something I can rectify locally or just something I`ve overlooked. There`s only 4 wires to the entire setup. I`ll see if there`s a local shop that can test it. In the meantime, I`m still open for helpful hints.
 
That`s it!!! Right out of the box the orange Mopar ECU is dead as a doornail. I took it to the local auto store ,it tested bad, bought a $20.00 Sorenson replacement and it fired right off the bat. I`ve heard the orange boxes have had problems but never figured I`d get one. What a shame I wasted half my day off trying to figure out what was going on! When you buy new product you expect it to work when you remove it from the box, so you second guess yourself and waste all your time chasing your tail. I`ll still have to mail it back for a credit or an exchange since I bought it mail order.Beware the orange boxes, they cost me an afternoon!
 
Glad you got it fixed.

I was also surprised to here about Ma's problem with the orange boxes. Must be gettin them made in bangledesh or something.
 
Thanks for the input fishy.You know they probably do out source those and they have one guy at Chrysler that installs the screw in the top of the wiring harness and puts a made in USA sticker on it. If anyone else out there has had a similiar experience I`d like to hear about it.I`m sure that Chrysler sells a ton of them and there`s bound to be some that fail, it just seems I`ve heard a lot of bad reviews on the orange boxes.
 
This is the first I've heard of this problem. I have installed many orange boxes over the past years and have never had one fail. Hope this isn't a start of problems to come.
 
I had a new MP resto voltage regulator that was bad too. Couldnt figure out why the car wasnt charging, put the old one on and it was fine. $30 down the drain. Also a member here swapped a orange box for a stock box at the track and picked up something like 3 tenths in the 1/4. Thanks for the quality parts mopar. Makes you want to switch teams sometimes.
 
Been racking my freaking brain the last couple of days. I did the conversion on my 273 and it did not given me any pronblems for the first 40-50 miles or so and BLAM...the car stalls after warming up. I get plenty of juice to the coil (6.75) , ballast resistor has the correct resistance (1.4ohms). Doesn't look like I'm getting fire to the plugs after the car gets warmed up a bit. I have the 4 prong unit with the orange ECU also.

I checked the #4 and #5 cavities and they are supposed to have like 150 to 900 ohms. I get 355 ohms when the car is cold. I let the car run at idle until it died again after about 10 minutes of idling. I checked the #4 and #5 cavities and get zero, zilch, nada on the meter. Weird and suspect to me because after about 40 minutes when the car cooled off the 4 and 5 cavities read 355-366 again.

The carb was rebuilt once before and I did it again today just for good measure ( takes a whole 15 minutes on the 2bbl). It seems to get a steady flow of gas from the jets and their is no smell of flooded fuel. The air fuel mixture was set up to keep the manifold pressure about 18-18.5. The Timing is 5 before TDC ad seems right but I don't think the spark is right.

So I am think I might also have in narrowed to the ECU. ANy other thoughts on my shared ORANGE puke box.

Thanks
 
Are you guys grounding these boxes and your motor good. It is not comon to be frying so many ecu boxes no matter their color. All I know is when ever I tried using a stock box on my 340 before I put on a MSD system, I could not get over 5000 rpm. When ever I had a orange box or the race chrome box it would go to 9500 + with no problems. These race version boxes do create more heat and will burn out under long term driving. I tried one in my van and it only lasted about a year.
 
ballast resistor reads 1.38 ohms...should be fine. Unit is well grounded. Will know if it is the ECU when I get a new one. ONce I fihure this out I will always keep a spare ballast resistor and ECU along with my extra belts and stuff in the trunk.
 
I took Fishys advice and ran the ECU down to the local auto parts store where they could test it. The Sorenson unit I bought there is still on my car and the replacement Mopar orange box is in the trunk along with a spare resistor.A quick scan of this forum and you`ll find a lot of people have had troubles with Mopar`s orange ECU.Post what you find out and you`ll do us all a great service. Good luck!
 
one more thing to add. make sure that your soldered connections are good. i found a ton of resistance near/at the solder joint and it varied significantly when I wiggled the wires. i resoldered the wires and i replaced the ECU so now I have an extra. fired up great and runs great now. yeah another gremlin gone.
 
I never soldered mine, just crimped and used heat shrink tubing. Are you refering to the harness plug at the top of your ECU? Did the ECU check out okay?
 
I think I have finally narrowed it down to the MP distributor. It reads 355 ohms when cold and reads nada when hot. I have a spare on my 340 in the garage and will change out the distributor. This is the last thing in the link. I have changed everything else out. I don't know where to look after this. Will find out tomorrow.

Yeah the harness plug wire that you fuse with the wire that goes to the ballast resistor.
 
I still have a hard time believing it is the MP distributor because it is brand new practically. Less than 100 miles on it so far. I hope I can get it warranty replaced by Mancini Racing. The distributor is a circuit and I guess it could open up when the coils get hot and expand and maybe causing a short. This is getting frustrating though.
 
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