Author Topic: Positive Coil wire  (Read 2135 times)

Offline Bluemonster71RT

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Positive Coil wire
« on: May 08, 2015 - 09:15:24 PM »
I am wiring up my 6al. I know that the small red wire is supposed to be hooked up to a switched +12v source. The directions say to hook up to the original + coil wire. Here is where my confusion come in. Nearly everything I have read here and on the other interwebs pages say to take the blue and brown wires from the ballast resistor and hook up the red to that. The thing is I have 2 brown on one side of the ballast and one black or maybe blue to the regulator. However I have a solo black wire that comes from the bulkhead that is/was the + coil wire. This goes against everything I have seen. Does this make sense to anyone? Might it been modified my someone that has worked on my car in its life? (original family owned car so it wasn't me). I'm not ready to run voltage to by wires yet but I'm trying to get there soon. Thanks. 
1971 Challenger RT 383 4spd




Offline Chryco Psycho

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Re: Positive Coil wire
« Reply #1 on: May 08, 2015 - 10:39:14 PM »
I assume you still had the ballast in the car so you should have a blue 12v feed to that & a brown wire going to the coil from the other side of the ballast , the brown wire is start so you will have power while cranking , the blue or what ever color on the other end of the ballast is the 12v run wire . The small red wire needs to connect to both to allow power to start & run the car

Challenger - You`ll wish You Hadn`t

Offline Bluemonster71RT

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Re: Positive Coil wire
« Reply #2 on: May 09, 2015 - 10:37:59 AM »
This is what I have. If I were to unwrap the harness I believe that one of the brown wires would be the one that goes to and was marked as the - side of my coil. The wire from the + side of my coil comes straight out of the bulkhead connector. This just doesn't seem right from everything I have seen or read. Maybe they got the - + labels switched? Where does the - coil wire typically come from?  Wiring is my nemesis. After all this work the last thing I need is a fire. 
1971 Challenger RT 383 4spd

Offline Chryco Psycho

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Re: Positive Coil wire
« Reply #3 on: May 09, 2015 - 11:44:24 AM »
coil + should be one of the 2 brown wires in your picture from the ballast .
 coil - goes either to the dist if you have points or to the ECU with electronic ign . you should have a second wire on the - coil for the tach feed , the neg wire would be black for points or black/ yellow for electronic . the Tach wire is grey

Challenger - You`ll wish You Hadn`t

Offline Bluemonster71RT

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Re: Positive Coil wire
« Reply #4 on: May 09, 2015 - 11:56:10 AM »
Ok good. So they marked it backwards. I put in a MSD pro billet distributor so it goes directly to the 6al. The 6al feeds the coil, so if I hook the small red to the correct brown wire in the ballast Ill be all set there yes? Do I omit all the other original wires and ballast or just leave them hooked up?  I believe I can run my autometer tach from the 6al I think. I don't remember how it was pre the msd stuff.

Thank you. The vision is getting clearer.   
1971 Challenger RT 383 4spd

Offline Chryco Psycho

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Re: Positive Coil wire
« Reply #5 on: May 09, 2015 - 12:41:00 PM »
the small red wire connects to the plugs at both ends of the ballast to work , MSD provides a pigtail with 2 male terminals on one end for a quick plug in , the ballast can be removed . The tach will run from the MSD6al but you may need the MSD adapter

Challenger - You`ll wish You Hadn`t

Offline DocMel

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Re: Positive Coil wire
« Reply #6 on: May 09, 2015 - 01:59:57 PM »
If you are running the billet distro and MSD, I dont believe you need the ballast.  I have both and do not run the ballast

Offline Bluemonster71RT

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Re: Positive Coil wire
« Reply #7 on: May 09, 2015 - 02:35:18 PM »
I figured that I would be omitting the ballast. For my understanding to work, I needed to have it in its original setup. I'm not good with electrical the way many of you guys and gals are to just "know" exactly what to do.  I did take the pigtail and put both sides of the ballast into it with the red wire on the other side. Then I was thinking (from what Chryco said) the wire that I have coming out of the bulkhead going to the coil may be the tach wire? Well hopefully in about a month if everything goes right I will get to fire it up and all truths will be told. Thank you very much.....again
1971 Challenger RT 383 4spd

Offline Chryco Psycho

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Re: Positive Coil wire
« Reply #8 on: May 09, 2015 - 08:26:01 PM »
 :2thumbs:

Challenger - You`ll wish You Hadn`t