Hello everyone,

5 Years ago I finished building my race motor (wow has it been that long ) and after the test run the car made some nice power and sounded great. The bad part is with the new cam and extras the car revs to 7K. I was tuning and playing around with the motor making sure everything was functioning properly then Rev and boom, the engine died. The new motor killed the OPTI which was a brand new Accel. No spark, no pulse, and no response from it. Everything else on the motor checked out just fine (tested all ignition and mechanical components). Sadly, after having some financial problems after the economic collapse I had to put my car in storage and from time to time sell some of the parts I had put on her just to keep the lights on. Things are going okay now and I'm trying to put her back together to get her rolling.

I've been out of the loop for 5 years and last I remember was an MSD OPTI being released. I've went through about 4 Opti's in the lifetime that I've had my car. Most of them from just racing and higher RPM's (though I'm thinking my MSD box might of had something to do with their shortened life span). I really don't like the OPTI although I know some people swear it's fine but I've been on the tow truck too many times because of it going out on me, and it's not very fun having your car die in the middle of traffic because of it. Now that I'm putting the motor back together I've been thinking about what would be best for a high revving motor?

I've thought about even doing the distributor cap setup and getting the intake worked to fit it. I was also looking into the coil pack setups but I don't remember either of them being that popular with most folks. I was always nervous about having it break and being SOL finding replacement parts because the manufacture went out of business or the parts are hard to find.

So for guys running hard setups what do you recommend?

Thanks for any and all help I appreciate it. The sound of my cars been stuck in my head these past 5 years like a song. I just want to hear it again. That and there's the guy down the street with a mustang who thinks it sounds good. I want him to hear what a real car sounds like.

 

Ever find a decent setup?

 

Nah, not yet I'm still looking. Hoping to get everything running soon if I can just get this ignition thing taking care of.

 

Yeah, I know what you mean we've all been there before. Good luck just keep searching I'm sure you'll find something.

 

If you are set on dumping the opti completely, there is a conversion out there that uses a cam sensor in place of the opti and a LSx computer and coil packs. It's not simple but it should rev high without issue.

It's by eficonnection.com and the system is called 24X....

 

Sounds like your rotor came off.

There's plenty of guys still successfully running the optispark on performance applications. Either a vented GM opti or vented GM opti body with a MSD cap & rotor will work well if you make sure to button down the rotor real good. I don't like the Accel because it is just a bushing and not a bearing in there. Not sure if you have a pre-95 engine because you don't give any info on your car, but those optis were more troublesome. If that's the case, you could convert it but it's a bit of fooling around.

Been hearing good things about the eficonnection 24X system/LS1 computer, but that's off my radar since my car runs fine and I have been mostly done with it a few years ago.

Now, quit talking to yourself and go fix your car

 

I bought the MSD pro billet years ago after hearing the opti can handle high rpm's better than other brands. I have had no trouble with mine, but took all kinds of precautions to make sure she stayed together. I would also recommend going back to OEM AC Delco if nothing else. If it were my car, I would set it up to run less rpm's which might be the only problem your dealing with. Its almost impossible to give accurate help without all the cars info.

 

App... 97ss 383-D1 MM6 with lots of mods. Been thru 6 opti's. Different brands and different failure modes.

Some brands are...
GM delco, Summit, dynatech, All_Ignition.com high-dollar version.

Now running the All Ign.com dist. Running OK. Like the MSD unit w/o the instruction sheet. Internals look the same as MSD. Lots of people don't like their cheap opti version, but, the exp version ($300) is running good for me.

Some failures...
Rotor fly off from melted plastic rivets. (Used 1/8" alum rivets (2)).
Opti encoder failed. No fix.
Bad dist vent. Low flow. Made my own high flow bal check.

Hope this helps. B.

 

Hehe, I do like how he did that.

I can't say I've ever heard anything good about the Accel units. Vented AC Delco hands down has had the best rep.

Spinning it to 7000 could be an issue. If I recall, 7000 is the limit of the LT1 PCM. Given the engine's purpose, a setup from Eficonnection might be in order.

I can tell you this....the tuning options with the LS1 computer are much better than the LT1. EFI Live and HP tuners both can bring in wideband inputs into their logging functions which is really nice. The stuff I've seen EFI live do is making me think about the 24x system....the only thing is the cost. It's not cheap.

I'm sure there are some boys here spinning in the 7000rpm range. Be best to hear from them on what works.

 

My 40k mile AC Delco opti is still kicking and pulling clean to 7k on my current setup. No rotor loctite or sealant. Out of the box and onto the motor!

 

That's good to hear, I didn't know you were spinning it that high. I do remember some threads around here on the issue, but it was a long time ago.

 

Thanks for all the help guys!

I'm going to take my time and read over all this as soon as I get out from work.