Ford ballast resistor

[Mike K]

I am theorizing but I think the divers bell type dissy was adding to the erratic ignition issues. With the squat coil sitting on top of the dissy , it is in a terrible position, subject to the heat from the radiator . With the improved crab dissy setup , they located the coil away from the hot environment.

When I had the little 1941 11D truck , I was amazed at how it would start from cold on a almost dead flat battery, the motor would be barely turning over, but it would fire and start . The trouble appeared after the resistor had heated up , I used to stop on the roadside and by pass the resistor with a wire link , this bodge fix got me home more than once.

After fiddling around , I discovered that the Voltage reg. was set rather too high , lowering the Voltage setting really improved the ignition system reliability . lower Volts = less Current through that resistor and less heat.