Ignition Retard Acting Stupid

[stroker1]

Anybody got any ideas why my timing retard is acting "Retarded"? When I apply 12v to the remote wire for the box, it acts like it's laboring real bad. It just runs crappy. I had 5 degrees in the box but it acted like it was pulling 20 deg. I couldn't actually check how much it was pulling because it wouldn't stay running long enuff to put a light on it. I finally ended up just unhooking the retard and turning the timing down with the distributor.

From my arming switch I am running 1 wire to activate the relay for the solenoids, 1 wire to activate the fuel pump relay, and 1 wire to the timing retard. All from the same arming switch. My window switch is grounding my relay for my solenoids. So even when the arming switch is on, it will not activate the relay for the solenoids until the window switch sends ground. WOT switch is breaking power from relay to the solenoids. FPSS is breaking ground to the solenoids.

FYI, it's a Mallory Hyfire #685 box.

[rustbucket]

I tried 2 different retard boxes that i thought were defective from msd and didnt realize that it wouldnt work without running the activate wire to the progressive controller instead of the nitrous activate wires. The directions didnt mention that. Probably not much help. I wish i new more.

[John_Heard]

Hard to say until you can get a light on it and see how much it's taking out. Maybe you can put some extra timing in it so it'll stay running when your testing to see what it's doing.

[stroker1]

Is there anything wrong with having the retard on the arming switch? I'm not running a delay, or timer, or a second stage. Just 1 stage right from the hole shot. It comes in at 3500 and cuts off at 6500 via window switch. Some guys run the retard off the positive lead to the solenoid. But I don't see the need if I'm running 1 stage and no progressive or delay.

[John_Heard]

Is there anything wrong with having the retard on the arming switch? I'm not running a delay, or timer, or a second stage. Just 1 stage right from the hole shot. It comes in at 3500 and cuts off at 6500 via window switch. Some guys run the retard off the positive lead to the solenoid. But I don't see the need if I'm running 1 stage and no progressive or delay.

Biggest problem with setting up the retard to go active when the arming switch is on is for staging, having the timing out may make it lazy coming up on the chip when you are staging. Worst case scenerio it might want to backfire if you are taking a lot of timing out..

Ideally you only want to take that timing out when the nitrous is activated, so it really needs to be hooked to the circuit with the throttle switch that turns on the solenoids.

[stroker1]

Talked to Mallory. They said it should work like I had it. But they recomended using the + feed to the solenoids. Or using the window switch to activate a separate relay just for the + to the timing retard. That second part sounds like drastic overkill to me.

Maybe I didn't have it hooked up the best way John. I'll hook it to the + lead to the solenoids. But before I do that I'm gonna fix up a jumper wire and see if it is something wrong with the box. Still, I dont see why it would have acted stupid like it did.