Hello, Roger. I wanted to comment further on this but did not want to hijack Steve's thread any further than I already had. So, I moved it here.
I read that article in The Falcon News last night. The writer. referring to an electronic ignition module, commented that "... a reasonable life expectancy for any electronic module might be 10 years or 100,000 miles, whichever comes first."
Dang! That essentially means for the life of the car!
But then the same writer says that "... electronic ignition will always be more expensive than maintaining the original points set up ..."
I checked some prices last night and that statement is not necessarily true.
You can buy a new "Pertronix 1281 1957-74 8 Cylinder Ford Electronic Ignition Conversion Kit" off e-bay for $66.99 with free postage.
I looked at O'Reilly's auto parts and their points range from $5.99 for the cheapest to $32.99 for their most expensive. A cheap condenser costs $5.69.
See: http://www.oreillyauto.com/site/c/se...con&vi=1334786
If you buy the good points and a condenser together together they are ... $44.99! Yowsa!
Points kit.JPG
See: http://www.oreillyauto.com/site/c/de...%26+condensers
So, doing a 25,000 mile tune-up with the cheap points and condenser, costs $11.68. To get to 100,000 miles would cost $46.72. $20.27 less than a PerTronix module. But, cheap points can stick and be more aggravation than they are worth.
At 25,000 mile tune-up intervals, the good points would cost ... $179.96 to get to 100,000 miles. $112.97 more than a PerTronix unit.
What I also think is interesting is that it is now increasingly difficult to find a conventional points tune-up kit. They used to be everywhere. I bought my present Falcon four years ago. At that time (before realizing that the car had a PerTronix unit) I bought a tune-up kit from FalconParts.com for $12. It had points, condenser, and a rotor. I checked last night and FalconParts does not seem to sell a conventional tune-up kit or points anymore. They do sell PerTronix units.
The writer of the Falcon News article suggested that if you drive with a PerTronix unit to keep a new one in the trunk as a spare in case the unit in use fails. That sounds reasonable.
Roger also said:
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