As of lately I have been asked a few times about coils and have tried to answer questions
to the best of my ability ...

A few things should be know-- I only know what I have experienced as I am no professional and just read lots of things to gain a little knowledge..


As for the BLUE COILS that has always been known to be the ticket - They are not always what they seem..

information:
http://www.ratwell.com/technical/BlueCoil.html


As in experience.. one instance is an OLD 40HP motor that I used to have would not take hills
with out loosing MPH no matter how things were tuned.. I had an MSD6AL box in my car so I decided to hook it up.. nothing more than connecting to the system and the car ran decent but I switched to the proper Blaster2 coil and the difference was night and day.. the car idled smoother and pulled everyhill without a problem.. Now I know the MSD is far cry from a stock config.. but when asking more of ignition the proper parts make all the difference..

I also worked on a car that hated the blue coil but loved the old school black german model
although at the time everything tested that the coil should be working but we chalked it up
to a bad coil.. in hindsite it was a NON-RESISTOR unit that is apparently a piece of (well not so good)

So information is just that take it for what you will .. remember there are other factors that
cause erratic spark or weak spark like dwell if your still running points.. input voltage/amperage depending on what charging system you have.. or how good your electrical system is (I.E. wiring)

a nother quick note about dwell and electronic iginitions are that points should be set around 48 to 52 degree's of dwell(meaning how many degree's of rotation the distributor rotates of a full circle [360 degrees]) is the coil allowed to saturate power before discharging(sparking)..
and will fluctuate with RPM and age of the points..
the electronic system does a full 58 degree's --- constant at any RPM..
this last note will affect your spark but is all for not if your coil is not up to the task..

and look at plugs (gap and condition) along with wires resistance and condition to deliver the spark Oh and I guess cap and rotor --

BOY THE LIST CAN KEEP GOING!! I guess it is the little things that make or break ya..

I'm loving all the tech ign tech articles tommie! Ign is one third of the triad (fuel, spark, compression) to make a internal combustion motor run and key to it running strong. Ratwell's website is chaulk full of excellent info(albeit mostly type 4 goodness, giggity). I was just on there reading his info on blue coils, since somebody asked me if my coil packs have higher voltage then the stock VW setup. BTW a blue coil only makes 18Kv, the smallest flame thrower coil makes 40Kv.

Another thing that needs to be correct is spark plug gap, too large and you'll have a weak spark and/or missfire, too close and your plugs will fail sooner. How much gap you can run is determined by the coil. I learned a lot about spark gap with my old turbo setup on my honda, I had to shorten the gap down to .020" because all the boost was blowing out the spark. Also peeps were saying you can't gap iridium plugs...i proved them wrong and now thats standard practice.

Right on.. and with my older motor that was to not to high on compression that I ran a full MSD setup that allowed me to move the gap out which I went to 35 on them with out fear of blowout.. 1776cc my 2180 with 10.2:1 I ran a stockish 25
these were basic NGKs ...

the gap shouldn't be played with to much as it will be strong in most cases for these streetmotors at 24-26 .. it is one of those basic base line things that we can mess with once everything else is in order..


the iginition system is a big factor of good running strong pulling cool operating motor that is overlooked way to often and just a general grasp of what is going on will make all the difference to a sweet
running motor..

what also should be noted about the high output coils is they do not require anymore voltage input than your basic coil.. just make sure you get the right one for your setup and enjoy..

I frogot to mention with my wasted spark setup i'm running .044" gap , I haven't noticed any blowouts. I need to datalog a few third gear pulls and verify no misfires. If I'm misfiring i'll crank the dwell up first, since I still got lots of overhead. I don't know if you can tell it, but I love playing with this stuff.

indeed

the coil is the small cylindrical part near the distributor?

not always

I miss you tommie