My good friends are thrashing to get a car done for AMBR...It's got a flathead V8 with a 3 bolt Wico mag, the kind that V's into 2 pieces and has four wires per cap...anyone have a schematic on how to wire it?? Getting down to the nitty gritty.... Thanks all!! [/QUOTE]
Put wires in the mag and plugs in the wires. Ground all the plugs. put your finger over the #1 hole. Crank it over and watch the plugs fire. Which ever plug sparks when your finger blows off the hole is #1 on the mag. the rest of the plugs will spark in firing order as you crank from there.
Chris - if Jim doesn't have an answer, I'd index the distributor drive to TDC of #1 cylinder, pull the caps, and observe the rotors as you make one revolution of the distributor drive. Just take a marker and label the cover under the rotor. I'm guessing wires are going to cross between the banks and separate mags too.
Chris, If you dont find the info you need i know a guy i could give a call to tomorrow that might know. JEFF
In addition to determining the plug wiring sequence, you need to make sure that the two 4 cylinder mags are properly synched with gears inside the V drive. It's been known for the individual mags to not be firing at even intervals because they had been dis***embled from the drive and not phased correctly when re***embled. Once you have No 1 located the two mags take turns in the firing order.
Hey Chris - here's a link with a wired up picture. Not complete, but it will at least get your friend started. http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=512389&highlight=wico Searching that boat leads to this site too. ****py pictures but you'll get the idea. A little searching just on that boat will probably get you a good look. http://www.vintagehydroplanes.com/boats/bachelor_one/bachelor1.html
I texted this to John but dont know if he got it or not, i believe this should be the wire diagram for his set up, i studied alot of the pics of the v drives on flatheads and noted were some of the wire went that i could see, from there i grabbed my barker drive and got the flathead firing order and came up with it, basically each wico is going to fire every other spark in the firing order, so one would do (flathead firing order 15486372) 1437 and the other 5832, the wicos compared to each other would have to be 1/4 rotation different from the other so when the one sparks 1 the next spark would be the opposite magneto. jeff
also, heres some more info, how i would go about setting it up if the mags have been pulled from the drive. step one, put the motor at top dead center #1, kinda hard to do with a flathead as there are no timing marks. step 2, install just the drive step 3, install the p***enger side mag with the rotor pointing at #1 on the cap step 4, turn the motor to top dead center #5 atep 5 install the mag on the driver side with the rotor point at #5 on the cap. now this is just the initial set up, to be done correctly one should have a distributor machine so you can set the correct advance and make sure the magnetos are in sink, basically you could have the one mag timing set correctly and the other one could be advanced or retarded. i think a guy could do enough playing to get it to run good enought to do what is needed up the car, it just would run to par, pay attention to head temps while playing with timing, if you check the 4 cylinders that are fired by one mag and there is a difference in temp in the 4 cylinders run by the other mag adjust accordingly if that makes sense,. jeff
oh and also, you could aim the rotor at a different contact on the distributor cap but you firing order would have to be moved to correspond if that makes sense too.
There is no way to pivot the magneto base to adjust timing because it bolts directly to the engine as did the distributors. Timing was set by placing the distributor (or magneto) into a fixture that has a female offset slot for the tang drive and a pin to locate the mounting holes properly. That is placed in a distributor machine such as a Sun Distribuscope and clamped in place with the drive chuck driving the shaft built into the fixture. The proper advance is set on the dist. or mag. on the machine by adjusting the advance plate inside. The dist. or mag can be simply removed from the fixture and bolted right to the engine and you are basically timed correctly. Some of the distributors have a small amount of adjustment of the advance plate externally but the distributor or magneto cannot be rotated normally. There were some trick mounting bases made however that would allow that. I had one many years ago on a V8-60 that had a base made from two crab-style distributor bases that allowed me to rotate my distributor that mounted to it. Wish I had a photo of it. Save yourself a lot of grief. Have your V drive and mags set up, synchronized and timed on a distribuscope by someone who know what they are doing.
The drive itself is not adjustable on the motor for timing but each mag is adjustable, heres a pic of mine, big slots for adjustments, also in these wico mags there are no lead plates as the timing is adjusted by turning the mag. I do agree that it should really be set up on a distributor machine but i dont think they have time for it at the moment, with some patience a guy could get it set up pretty close and then have it fine tuned at a late date when time permits. Basically on the machine you would set the timing of the first magneto and then set the timing on the second magneto. the plate your are talking about is a lead plate. basically on a stock ford distributor the advance plate is adjusted for timing, and when you move that it throws off the dwell and point gap etc etc because the plate doesnt fit prefectly in the housing, so basically what the lead plate was for is you set up the distributor for the dwell point gap and initial timing and then you can fine tune it for that engine when its on the engine with out messing up the dwell and point gap. i have a buddy thats a well respected distributor guy (Don Bonenkamp) and he knows his ****, ive been talking distributors with him alot lately learning alot of cool info. jeff
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