Technical Buick Nailhead - HEI vs MSD?

I'm looking at changing the didtributor on my 364 Nailhead,

Looks like the MSD versions are about £600 more expensive than the HEI ones, can anybody tell me the difference in the two, apart from the huge jump in price?

 

HEI ones are Chinese made
And 100% uglier

 

Everything is made in china. As long as it works and is reliable I dont mind. As for ugly, I'm hopefully not going to need to look at it that much

 

sounds like a false dichotomy.

 

I'll try to get the ball rolling in the right direction. I believe that HEI is high-energy ignition and MSD is multiple spark discharge. MSD is probably also HEI, but HEI probably isn't also MSD.

 

I guess ya answered the question

 

It looks like "works and is reliable" are criteria.

 

Try Davis Universal Ignition for the HEI. Pricey, but made in the U.S.

 

"dichotomy"...nice !

 

Just described points

 

The factory 57-66 distributor is a good reliable unit and easy to overhaul. Since the springs are above the breaker plate, it is also easy to change the springs to tailor the advance curve. Use the Pertronix lobe sensing unit (I think 1181LS) and a good 1.5 OHM coil.
Because of the aggressive cam in the early 364s, set the initial timing to 5-10 degrees and the advance curve all in at 30 degrees at 2200 RPM.

 

Aah, yeah, but as points wear, the dwell angle changes. As much as I love the idea of still being able to fix a points based unit at the side of the road, a lot has to be said for the preciscion and reliability of electronic.

Think I have an issue with the mechanical advance on my distributor. I have an electronic conversion kit that I bought from rock auto, that I havent fitted yet, but its not going to fix whats going on with the centrafugal advance, so I figured a whole new unit to drop in would save any messing about trying to get the best out of a 66 year old one.

 

For just a cruiser type car, the HEI is fine. They've powered many thousands of engines over MANY years !

But since you neglected to say..............if the engine/car is more of a higher rpm, higher compression, hot rod, put the MSD in.

Chinese.......(Anthony) WTF........I'll just bet that the computer that you wrote your note on, was made in China or Japan !!! You have a cell phone...yeah...Chinese or Japan or Korea, etc., etc. !!
Get with it.

Mike

 

Yep.
Country of origin isn’t all that big a deal anymore.
products have different quality levels. The cheap Chinese HEI isn’t built to the level my phone is

 

There just has to be some guys on here that have Buick Nailheads and did some ignition upgrading. I'd suggest either modifying your thread title or maybe start another thread that attracts Buick guys. Your title is pretty general, which I don't mean this as a criticism, but you might give it a try and see if the word Buick in the title doesn't tend to draw input from people with some more specific info. Good luck with getting it converted, I think its a good change.

 

MSD’s are not MSD’s above certain rpm’s and usually above the RPM where you need it the most if racing. I don’t know their performance using a higher voltage but Davis ignitions perform very well at a higher voltage. I personally don’t give a damn about the look where performance is what I want…..
I’m not a fan of a red box on a firewall or colored distributor cap and wires.

If your not going to keep a points unit a Pertronix II with one of their black coils and a ballast resister is pretty hard to beat and no will ever know it’s their if you don’t tell them. 11 trouble free years on mine using the same spark plugs for 25,000 miles.

 

No thank you. I’ll just have a glass of water.

 

I've gone plenty fast with points and a stock coil, don't expect "performance" from the fancy electronic stuff.

If you can't deal with the wear issues of the stock distributor, then you have a sort of valid reason to get away from it. I have gotten to where I like tinkering with the old stuff, it gives me the feeling that I'm actually driving an old car.

Just be prepared for electronics to fail suddenly...it's unlikely, but it happens.

 

My take on options, speaking from a position of having rebuilt/recurved
25,000+ distributors in the last 18 years:
*HEI is great for a daily driver aka grocery getter type reliability, but performance can and will suffer under 2000 and over 4500 rpm unless you start spending bug $ to overcome some electronics issues. Think Davis Unified Ignitions.

*MSD is ok - it doesn't have signal issues like the HEI and is a little better for performance BUT, and this is a big one, quality has dropped off the cliff since Holley acquired them. What you get in an entry level box now is what used to be sold as the Chinese house brand distributor from Summit - full of issues from ABS plastic bits that melt, inferior coatings, and DOA modules. If you want the MSD box instead of "ready to run," there's virtually no advantage to using the "6" box. You have to spend big and go up to the "7" series to have real gains.

*OEM points setups are dead reliable and the metallurgy is exceptional compared to aftermarket options. Standard Ignition points and condensers aren't what they used to be, but they're still the best on the market - capable of 7K+ rpm in most cases if the rest of the distributor is up to par.

*Pertronix... Ugh. DO NOT use the lobe sensing modules!!! They are terrible at picking up a precise "corner" on a rounded points cam, so your cylinder to cylinder timing wanders a LOT!!! They also do a better job than any other Pertronix at picking up noise, eluding to random misfires from an undercharged coil when the next cylinder tries to fire. The 1181 standard kit is the one to use if you insist, and it'll do better in an OEM distributor than in their billet Chinese housing. With this said, I've never failed to make more HP with points when removing a Pertronix.

*There are plenty of other electronics packages, such as the one-wire setup sold by a lot of catalog businesses. DO NOT use the 1-wire setups. They are also VERY prone to have drivability issues versus HEI, MSD, points, or the standard Pertronix.
I still run points in almost all my vehicles. Even the ones that are fuel injected. I simply want the consistency and durability, and the performance is great.

 

Incorrect .MOST are made in China. Davis Unified Ignition (DUI) is made in the USA....but theyre not cheap

 

And still ugly

 

Aah thanks, good idea. I've edited it now. I'm sure this topic has probably come up in discussion many times. Cheers

 

Well, as I said, pretty much everything is made in china. I bought some wheel cylinders for the Buick some years back, bought and shiped from the USA, guess what? Made in China stamped on them. You can sure as hell bet that most of the components on modern cars are manufactured in the far east, especially the electronics.
DUI ? Wonder if that was intentional? Haha.

 

Wow, thanks for all the info, theres certainly a lot to think about. Its not for a modded engine, just a run of the mill rebuilt 364 Nailhead in a 58 Buick. Nothing fancy. Doesnt need to go fast, just for local short trips crusing around. At the moment I'm having trouble getting it to not stall under load..having done a few tests, I am convinced the distributor is the weak link, seing as that's the last part to be replaced. I changed points, condenser, cap, rotor, leads and wiring from the minus side of the coil, but I think the mechanical advance is causing the issue. I figured the best thing would be to drop a new electronic one in, then I can definately rule that out as the issue. Plus I thought it would run smoother anyway. If everything I have read about electronic ignitions is to be believed. I did buy a kit from Rock Auto, its the type with the magnet ring, rather than the lobe sensor. But now I am thinking, the rest of the distributor i , gears, bearings, mechanical advance etc is still 66 years old. May as well just put something in there that's new

 

You can look at the mechanical advance easily by just removing the cap and rotor. You can also check it's action if you have a timing light. It's not rocket surgery.

Vacuum advance cans go bad over time.

But there are other things that will cause the symptoms you have...

remember, replacing parts isn't quite the same thing as troubleshooting.

 

For what it is worth, I had Dave Ray (dave's small body HEI) convert my nailhead distributor. He uses a reluctor wheel and pickup with a GM HEI module. His work is excellent. His timeliness not so good. I think he had my distributor for about 8 months. Since I was in the process of building the car it was going into, this wasn't a big problem. He did have me worried when he stopped responding on the progress.

The only reason I went to HEI instead of points, is that the engine is in a Model A and the distributor is hard to get to. If I had easy access, I would have probably stayed with points.

 

Yeah, of course. I tested the vaccum advance and that works, I did look at the mech advance, i didnt see anything wrong, but using the timing light, the mark stays static when the RPMs are increased, so looks like a problem with that. But I havent a clue what. The two arms seem to move freely. Looks like the springs are still attached. So something is wrong. I figure putting a new distributor in will save me wasting my time trying to figure it out, when I really have very limited knowledge with regards to this side of the timing.

 

I hear ya, its not that easy on a 58 Buick either..since the engine needs warming up before any alterations to the timing can be carried out, I end up having to crawl the whole 9 yards of hood space across a red hot engine to the firewall to get to the distributor, I'm only 5'6" , so thats pretty much my whole body laying across it, hoping my belt buckle doesnt catch on the radiator cap and suddenly pop it off.

 

I have MSD distributors in my flathead, hemi, VW and 442 at the moment. All run great with no issues. I can't speak to the others.

 

I may be mistaken, but I think MSD has gone all off shore production now, as well.