Early Valiant Barracuda Club home page

Electronic Ignition Upgrade


  • Looking for suggestions on doing an electronic ignition upgrade to my 64 valiant slant 225. It runs pretty good now but considering changing over.

    Dan Borkowski

  • As for the /6 ignition upgrade, I'm not sure there is a Mopar kit available for that motor, but you can check the local swap meets for the distrubitor, harness and ignition box and do the upgrade yourself. There is a tech article on the website with the wiring diagram to hook it up. You will need a dual ballast and I suggest upgrading the charging system to an electronic regulator to avoid spikes from the points type regulator shorting the ignition box.

    Roger Kizer

  • I have the MP electronic ignition. It uses a different ballast, but doesn't require dual. The HEI is appealing because you can get rid of the ballast. More on that whole thing here:

    Daryl Howland

  • Honestly, easiest bang for the buck is the HEI. You don't need the orange box, you can ditch the ballast resistor (the weakest link in the MP ignition system), and costs you probably $100 with new parts. I run it and like it a lot

    Menko Johnson

  • In the ten years I have run the mopar performance dist. in my v8, it has been trouble free. No failed ballast resistor (yet- always one in the g.b) and the regulator has never destroyed the control box. Jacobs electronics used to make a good setup also...

    Brion Traill

  • I have HEI on my 273 V8, I went back to an old school mech reg after I blew a couple of electronic units. seems to work fine, and cost me 5 bucks.

    Michael Adler