The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay Points-what supplier?

Looking to pick up an extra set of points just to have on hand. I see lots of remarks about how points these days aren't so good anymore. Are there any brands or suppliers that are at least better than others?

Thanks.
Ron

There are usually several sets of NOS Delco-Remy (NOT AC-Delco!) points on Ebay. Prices vary quite a bit so shop a little before bidding or buying. Ditto for condensers- - - -old stock Delco-Remy is the only way to go, other than Jon G's lifetime condenser.
Jerry

FYI, What I discovered doing the condenser project is that some of the old stock Delco-Remy condensers had little capacitance remaining and worse, one would produce the equivalent of a dead short. They were all simple foil-wrapped gel type round capacitors and the gel had just dried out in them. One I disassembled had gel that looked like dried old varnish. I think I posted the results somewhere back then. Typically .22uF is what we need. I recall one of them having .07uF and another of unknown make (possibly Standard Products) having no capacitance left. No idea what voltage they're able to tolerate.

For what it may be worth, a late uncle of mine was one of the home workers making foil capacitors after work at night for use in aircraft, walkie-talkies, radios, radar equipment and other government applications during WWII. They were made of foil and wax impregnated paper wound into cylinders and they used to seal them with wax to keep them from drying out as fast and to help them stay as accurate as possible.

With the exception of the Ford trucks, all my vehicles use points and condensers.

After a slew of brand new condensers failed in under 1000 miles the Mustang, Galaxie, and others, I purchased Jon G's 200,000 hour condenser for all of the vehicles, including the '39 Packard. Not even a hint of condenser related trouble since then. When the Mustang unit failed, I thought the timing chain had jumped a tooth or stretrched or something because the symptoms were so bad. It didn't occur to me that a condenser with about 900 miles on it would be the culprit.

Luckily I figured it out by the time the Galaxie's brand new condenser failed and left me on the side of the road, 500 feet from my house at midnight on Christmas! I had one of Jon's in the glove compartment ready to go. After that, I removed the little silver barrels from all of my vehicles, including Ol' Roy.

As for points, I've had generally good performance from Standard Motor Products Blue Streak brand. If you can find NOS Delco-Remy points on ebay or someplace, they are probably the best. I have those in the Cadillac, Blue Streak in the Chevy truck.

NAPA sells some good points for the V8 engines, never looked for the inline six so no comment on those. I can post some numbers when i get to my other computer. You want the heavy duty points used in the higher horsepower cars.

I've seen standard replacement points start cutting out around 4000 rpm on my distributor machine, the heavy-duty ones will run up to 6300 and never miss a beat. The springs are much stronger to keep the arm in contact with the lobe. You can hear the difference as they run.

The old school "high RPM" trick on point type race distributors was to double up on the springs- - - -scavenge one from a discarded point set. Of course, rubbing block wear was an issue, but a set of points seldom lasted more than a few races. "Lubriplate" white grease was the go to product when setting up distributors 50+ years ago.

www.ebay.com/itm/325678768751?

Jerry

AC-Delco part number D105P or D111 is what the 235's use.

On EBAY, you can find the original foil packaged ones, or NAPA has Echlin brand, # CS763A heavy duty points set. They sell five different sets of points that interchange with D105P, the heavy duty is what I would use. The foil pack ones are the original ones, the box sets are later ones, you can get them local. They won't be the same quality.

Thanks for that information Joe, and everyone else as well. Very helpful.

No Name, reproduction points are definitely suspect. I bought such a set off a reputable classic chevy supplier and the point contact (the little round thingy) came off within the first week. Drove me nuts looking for everything else that could go wrong before checking that part.