Rebuilding a distributor

I am trying to collect information on rebuilding a distributor (non-vacuum advance) for my 71 911e. I am considering distributor wobble as a source of my high rpm miss detailed in prior posts under "CD Ignition Woes."

I have searched the archives and have found bits and pieces of info, alot of it from Warren (Early S Man). Warren recommended bushings from an industrial supply place. Has anyone done this? What am I asking for? What are they made out of? Do I need to bring in the old ones, or are there specs I need to give them? The old ones would probably be out of spec. What parts get lubricated with distributor grease? How hard is this? Is there any easy way to judge how much play my distributor shaft has (Warren says it should be less than .001 ")? Any other steps in this process I should know about? Is there a step by step similar to the Pelican tech articles?

Thanks,
Scott

If you can wiggle the distributor shaft by hadn, the bushings should be replaced. If, in using a timing light, you see that the timing jumps around at all, the bushings need replacing.

You'll probably have to drive a pin out in order to disassemble, but once apart, take the body and the shaft to the supply house, and they will measure and sell you bushings that fit. Seriously, put the housing in the oven and the bushings in the freezer. Install them quickly and they will slide in very easily. Much more difficult if they are both at room temp.

Clean everything up and put a little grease on the stuff that moves.

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'83 SC

I thought you were supposed to put clean engine oil on the bushings and shaft...?

You may consider putting a Petronix Ignitor module in there. This will give an optical pickup of some sort and eliminate point bounce/wobble or whatever.

I am not certain if it is made for your dizzy, but it would solve this problem with less trouble.

Also I would add some sort of CDI module if you do not already have one. Like MSD, Universal Corp, Crane, Jacobs, etc.

Hope this helps,


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Adrian Pillow
1979 911 SC
1966 VW Microbus
PCA - Peachstate Region

Scott,

I am not aware of any articles or directions for the rebuilding process ... mostly it is just disassemble, clean, measure, common sense stuff. The bushings I have used were 'oilite' bronze type. It probably would help to take the old bushings to the store so that the OD can be measured precisely.

The wear that has occurred is associated with the centrifugal advance mechanism. There is no problem with the points in any CDI-system from '69 thru '77 ... they tend to last 5 years without problems. So, putting in optical triggers is just fluff and advertising hype ... it accomplishes nothing to improve reliability of a Bosch CDI-system! If there is wear on the shaft or bushings you will still have timing 'scatter' with optically-triggered ignition! No MSD ignition or other aftermarket system will improve the performance over the factory Bosch system, and as long as there is a centrifugal advance-controlled ignition, you still have to deal with wear inside the distributor.

Bosch grease is used on the pivots for the advance weights, on the cam and rubbing block for the points. Oil is used down the center of the shaft for the centrifugal advance mechanism, under the felt plug ... under the rotor. It should be oiled at every engine oil change, and any time you do anything to the ignition system: check timing, change sparkplugs or wires, etc. If you oil the distributor and check the end-to-end resistance of the wires at every oil change and valve adjustment, you will have a trouble-free engine for a longer time than if they are ignored! Simple fact. Nothing in aftermarket ignition systems will change that fact ... there is no such thing as maintenance-free ignition as long as you still have a distributor on your engine!

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Warren Hall
1973 911S Targa

Warren,
Where did you get the Oilite bushings?
Mark

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Mark B. Wilson
'70 911E
mbwilson@home.com
http://www.marksobsessions.20m.com/


[This message has been edited by expatriot98 (edited 03-23-2001).]

Mark,

At a local industrial bearing supply. Almost any bearing supply store would have them in stock, or could order them if out of stock.

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Warren Hall
1973 911S Targa

Thanks Warren...

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Mark B. Wilson
1970 911E
mbwilson@home.com
http://www.marksobsessions.20m.com/

I agree fully with Warren. Avoid the Pertonix. It gave me nothing but problems. I finally changed back to the stock system and haven't had any troubles since.

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'76 911S

'80 924 M471