Technical looks like half of a mag.

I have bought a lot of parts at an estate sale lately, I can not figure out what this half mag is used for, any ideas

 

If that was ever a magneto it isn't any more, that big empty cavern is where the magnets should be. LOL

 

It fits on a flathead, and adapts SOMETHING that works in the ignition industry, probably a mag. If the rest of the thing is there somewhere, $$$$...so go back and root through the trash!

 

Does that have the pre-42 three-bolt pattern? Show us a pic of the mounting surface.

 

Here are more pieces and parts that came with it, magnets in the brown paper, and a harmon Collins rotor button in the bag

 

Rear part is a chunk of '37-41 distributor...multiple drives are probably variants to allow timing adjustment...some of the parts may be entirely unconnected, like the Ford vac piston adjuster that has no location on this. Interesting jigsaw puzzle there!!

 

Would it be an adapter to set another distr or magneto on a distributor machine, like a Sun?

 

You say that about all old Ford crap!

 

my guess is that some one lopped the top off a harmon and colins magneto and then just ran a seprate coil.

so they basically turned it back into a normal distributor!

the two little posts on the front that unscrew hold the stock 42 ford distributor cap in place

 

It does look like that, looks like they milled it off and made a cover plate for it. Would it still work like that? If it did, I think I'd still use it, just for the hell of it.

 

I'm with Titus on this.

 

well basically a magneto is a distributor and coil all in itself, the point still open and close and tell the coil when to spark, so if you ditch the coil side of it you can still use it as a distributor to trigger a coil, now what maeks this set up easier to do that with is that the cap has a seperate coil lead, you just plug it into a external coil and make your connection from the points to the coil, presto a fancy distributor.