dirtySOHC's

installing my universal BTM today and when it was time to crank up the car........no luck. the motor just keep turning over. I called MSD and their instructions for a 97 civic were to

1. disconnect neg wire from coil and hook up the white wire from the BTM to the coil
2. wire in the orange wire from the BTM to neg wire from the coil that was unhooked (this wire goes to the ICM)
3. black wire to chasis ground
4. red wire to 12volt ignition source

sounds simple right? well thats wat i said but the bitch aint workin. i tried calling MSD back but they were already out of the office.

i am turning to my fellow HT peeps to help out if they can...........can anyone fill me in?

b16ahybrid

Are you sure you have the directions for the btm itself and not the ignition?
Because you should only have to hook it into the harness (plug) that goes to the distributor. At least thats all i had to do. no messing with the coil. Well i have the crane unit and all i had to do was cut the signal wire going to the distributor hook it to the trc (same as btm) and then there was a signal out wire from the trc that connected to the other end of the dist. wire that i cut (to complete the circuit).

b16ahybrid

oh and double check your wires, you probably have a loose connection or miss connected wire, sounds like your getting no spark

dirtySOHC's

i got the directions from the MSD tech. the ones that come with the BTM are useless.

i have checked the connections and everything looked good.

b16ahybrid

Is this just the btm or is it the 6al-btm?
All the btm does is alter the signal going to the distributor, so why it would hook up to the coil i'm not sure....maybe the msd is different then the crane..

dirtySOHC's

its just the BTM alone (universal).

i found some new directions from the jacksonracing site and rather than having the orange wire on the ICM it had to be the white and the white that was on the coils neg went to the ICM......MSD gave me backwards directions.

anyway i switched the wiring and the car started up just fine. took it for a drive at 1 degree retard per pound to be safe. in second hit WOT at 3K and right as it starts to build boost past five pounds.......i get bogging and detonation. so i try 1 and half degree and still the same. tried a half degree.......same.

i dont get it. i have to have some bad wiring or something or i have a bad connection but i have triple checked everything.

b16ahybrid

Look at crans web site under ignition accessory's. Those are the directions i used, see if they collaborate with the jackson racing or msd, they should all be the same since they all do the same function.
It's like a tial wg vs a delta gate, both do the same job but fro different manufactures.
Hope this helps you a little.....whats your timing set at? 16 degree's?

dirtySOHC's

well...i finally got the the thing to work. i re-did all the wiring and triple checked it. i also had to set my base timing at 2 degree's of retard beacause it just didnt wanna work with it at stock timing. works like a charm and detonation is no more.

to clear everything up for future buyers of the universal MSD BTM # 5462

1. red wire of the BTM is T-tapped off the black yellow wire in the distributer harness
2.disconnect the wire from the ICM in the distributer going to the negative on the coil. i completely got rid of that wire.
3. hook up the white wire of the BTM to the ICM and the orange wire on the BTM to the coil neg.
4. the black wire on the BTM goes to a ground.

that is it on how to wire it. i know a few ppl asked about this and there was never any clarification. hope this can help someone.

b16ahybrid

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by dirtySOHC's &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i also had to set my base timing at 2 degree's of retard beacause it just didnt wanna work with it at stock timing. works like a charm and detonation is no more.</TD></TR></TABLE>


Really? I would think that if it were working properly you would be able to run stock timing. Maybe it's not working properly, and the detonation went away because you retarded your base timing? I know if i run stock timing (no timing control) I get a little bit of ping at about 5psi and about 8psi, but if i retarded the timing 2 degree's it would go away. I chose to use a trc-1 (btm) so i could run stock timing, and a little sense of security. Plus the ability to run the most timing without detonation....

You may want to look into the btm a little more, because my guess is that the bt is NOT working.....I don't mean to rain on your parade, but you should be able to run full timing and no detonation. A good test woul dbe to set it at max retard per psi (2psi i believe) then run the car, if it's working properly it will retard the timing so much that it will cause the car to bogg. Thats what i did to test mine I set mine to 3 degree per psi, about 6psi the car would bogg, i set it back to about .75 per psi and the bogging went away...

SOHC_power

I hooked mine up and it never has worked right. I got the 6al-btm. When we tried to adjust it the car detonated. Even at .5 per psi. So I don't know what the deal is. It has been sitting in my cup holder useless for the past 6 months. $485 down the drain.

b16ahybrid

Hmm, do you have it hooked up to a vacuum source? If not all it's going to do is advance your timing

dirtySOHC's

i can try that, becuase when i did have it at stock timing it would bog at only .5 retard on the BTM and anything higher it was the same.

i gotta play around with it.

b16ahybrid

yeah because you should be able to run stock timing and have no detonation. In theory you could even run advanced timing out of boost.