Jon, you're probably one of less than a dozen people on the forum who actually understands the function of a condenser in an ignition circuit. Since the primary ignition circuit also includes the ignition switch, the battery, and every hot and ground wire in between the condenser's components, figuring the circuit resistance would be quite an exercise in higher mathematics.
That's why I asked the question, Jerry. I was inwardly hoping there would be a simple answer...something like "oh, you know the standard 66 and 2/3 ohms."
How about including the inductive reactance of the coil windings in the mix on the second or third oscillation of the primary waveform?? Few, if any people realize that the condenser discharges itself by flowing current backwards through the battery, several times a second, to charge from the ground side. How many of us know that the little sine wave at the "points open" part of an oscilloscope pattern is the voltage slowly dissipating as the primary voltage spike from magnetic induction bleeds away? Now, let's do that something like 60 times a second at cruise RPM!
And you'd think something that has a measurable effect on the process ought to be more precise, wouldn't you?
"Voltage transient spikes"- - - - - -like maybe a loose plug wire that dangles out there in midair and causes 20KVDC to look for somewhere to go- - - -and fires down the coil high tension snout to the primary terminals, for instance? I've only seen that happen a few thousand times!
Jerry
Yes, at least a few thousand times. But you can always grab it and give that 20KVDC a temporary home.
