Ignition coil failure

[SJ]

I was on the motorway the car started losing power and eventually stalled, had to get a tow home. my ignition coil had failed, swapped it for a spare and all was fine.
But is this just bad luck or is there something else that may have triggered the coil to fail.?
A quick google told me to check the spark plug gap, which i have yet to do. Any ideas?

[clive]

What ignition do you have? Is it electronic with ballast or just plain old points?

[SJ]

It is electronic, I have one of those pertronix conversion kits fitted and the coil was a black epoxy "flame thrower '

[Roger King]

Which Pertronix? Ignitor I and Ignitor II are ballasted systems, requiring a ballasted coil, Ignitor III (with the built-in rev-limiter) requires the full 12V continuously. I'm assuming you do not have a separate ignition box, it's all inside the distributor.
I've had Lucas coils fail, but (touchwood) not Pertronix or other US aftermarket ones. It can happen, though, for no obvious reason. Assuming you have the correct coil for your system I would simply replace and carry a spare.

[SJ]

It is an ignitor 1 it is fitted to a lucas 35DLM8 and the coil was a Flame Thrower 1, 1.5 ohm, 40,000.
It was what they had recomended for my set up.

I see a lot of flame throwers failing early mentioned on various American forums, and a possible commoun complaint.

I have since emailed them to see what they say.

[Roger King]

Interesting - I've not had one fail, but I haven't had an Ignitor I so probably not much help! I have Mallory and MSD modules in cars, but the 289 has an Autolite distributor with an Ignitor III in it, no ballast resistor. If you have the coil Pertronix recommed, I'd stick with that. Although I'm sure you could cross-ref the spec for a 'local' one if necessary, a lot of UK cars had ballast resistors.

[Karl]

Your coil with 1,5 Ohm resistance is correct for a V8. There should be no other ballast resistor in the system. Make sure your ignitor 1 and the coil run on 12 V DC

[Roger King]

http://www.pertronix.com/docs/instructi ... s/1181.pdf

Removal of ballast resistor and use of appropriate coil recommended. Check that your ignition system is providing full 12V in the 'run' position, not just 'start'.

Roger

[SJ]

Thanks for all that Roger, I must check the voltage later and the specs of the old coil i re-fitted.
cheers