How to keep you distributor in good nick

[swedishandgerman]

Originally Posted by Tail

NOS replacement vaccum unit here on e-bay if anyone is interested http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/NOS-VOLVO-...item2eb8368bf6 and another here http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/NOS-VOLVO-...item2eb887b2fc

They're old!! I think they might even be B16 ones. I've tried to find out what they are by googling the part numbers. Neither part numbers are B18 ones

[Tail]

That guy seems to have bought up a whole load of old volvo parts he also has some original volvo tools as well, he lists part numbers but not what they do, might be of some use to someone

[Derek UK]

He's been putting parts from this stash up for a long time. Overblown descriptions and decidedly high prices mean that he's not selling much, probably.....

£120 for Bosch contact breaker mounting plate!

[Tom7]

Originally Posted by swedishandgerman

I was hoping to do that with the distributor I took out of the aforementioned Beetle this weekend, but there's so much endfloat in the shaft, I've condemed it!

It is such a shame the £35 distrutors you can get from Acuspark for aircooled VW's rotate the other way to Volvos, because although the finish looks rough around the edges, the advance curve from both the mechanical advance and the vacuum are as smooth as anything. You can't buy the individual parts any where near the price of one of these things, nor can you even buy a good new vacuum unit. If it doesn't last too well, just chuck it out and buy another!

I'm trying to work out if you can botch up something out of an old Amazon distributor and a new Acuspark VW distributor.... Shaft from the Amazon distributor and all the other bits from the other....? I think the weights and springs will fit. It might not have exactly the same advance curve, but advance at idle and max advance are exactly the same as an Amazon. It'd be a load cheaper than having to buy a 123!

Problem is that the vac unit goes the wrong way, but you can buy an mechanical advance only 009 type, same as fitted to B18B's. Should work, I reckon.

Endlfloat might be down to a missing fiber washer at the bottom of the shaft. The cast iron bosch distributors are much better than the cast ally items usually on VWs, you can always have your distributor re-curved. I can highly recommend Bestek as they do an excellent job with lucas dizzies and do good electronic ignition kits.

[swedishandgerman]

Originally Posted by swedishandgerman

Now I'm excited, the geek boy that I am!

I just spoke to the extremely nice people at Accuspark who are sending me an 009 distributor to play with, free of charge. I'll report back to them how I get on and if successful, they'll make a load for us 'ere Amazon owners

I need to take the thing apart and put it together again with the innards upside down, so to speak

Shame - it's not possible to do. The weights won't fit in upside down and the weight limiters can't be reversed

However, if the weights were reversed, this distributor would definitely work in an Amazon

[swedishandgerman]

Originally Posted by Derek UK

NB: B18 distributors of the type that have the low tension connection made by an insulated bolt that goes through the distributor body (all B18 AFAIK) require a cap which has a small semi circular cut out to clear this fitting. Adjacent to that is a recess which allows the tab behind the retaining clip to locate the cap correctly i.e. Plug wire one will always be next to the notch in the rim of the distributor body. Therefore the caps for the B18 and B20 are different. The B20 condensor through connection is a much less annoying rubber block.

I'm all confused.....

Derek - which distributor are you saying that requires that semi-circular thingamer?

I have a B18A distributor here at the moment with the insulated bolt that goes through the distributor body, but the B20A cap that I have fits (IE the type with the recess for the tab). There is no semi-circle in the cap and the condenser doesn't get in the way

[swedishandgerman]

Actually - I think the semi-circular thingamer cap is for some B18B distributors

[940_Turbo]

Originally Posted by swedishandgerman

Shame - it's not possible to do. The weights won't fit in upside down and the weight limiters can't be reversed

However, if the weights were reversed, this distributor would definitely work in an Amazon

Weld them and file them to a new shape?

[swedishandgerman]

Originally Posted by 940_Turbo

Weld them and file them to a new shape?

Dunno. They're quite different to the Bosch ones. That's with reference to the shape of the weights and the way they attach to the shaft

The other thing that concerns me is that the distributor body is cast aluminium instead of cast iron - is this going to cause a problem, I wonder?

In fact, there's a Bosch parts specialist that has just opened in Exeter. I went down there and bored the poor guy to death with a list of Volvo part numbers and it seems he can get a lot of the individual parts for the stanadard Amazon distributors that I reckon I can easily rebuild the small collection of distributors I have

The only thing I can't get are new weights and springs

[tabin]

Awesome post!

You must have had quite some inspiration