Not because of the performance, but because of the location.

I put on my Jegs solid brass dist. and rotor and 8mm power wires. The wires come with these little clips that I put on the old wires as I replaced the plugs. I tried to do the swap-the-wire thing, but I gave up, and got my Chiltons and went to 2-17.

HERE IS WHAT YOU SHOULD DO:

(This is not the Chiltons way but mine)

1) Mark the old wires. with the clips. Drivers side odd, Passenger's even.

2) Remove the entire distributor and all the wires.

3) Going counter clock wise install 1-2-7-5. These are the ones you can't see. I used my wifes mirror, which I also broke.

4) Install the new rotor and distributor.

5) Keep going counter clockwise with 6-3-4-8. Then coil.

6) Swap the markers as you go. Your longest wires will be 1,2 and 4 (for some reason)

The Jegs 8mm power wires come with a boot that is for a canister type coil, not the stock Dodge. I had to reuse my old coil wire. I wonder if I can purchasea cansiter typeand slap it on my truck?

 

I did something similar.
I marked my wires and removed the whole cap and wire assembly. I then matched the wires for length, marked their respective numbers, attached them to the new cap,and replaced the cap/wire assembly. Once I replaced my plugs, I connected the wires.
It worked like a champ!

 

I'm not trying to do the whole "well I did it, so there" thing, but I was able to do the one wire at a time thing. I have to admit to using more foul language than is legal, but was able to finish. The trick for me (besides my 38 inch sleeve length) was that I gave up trying to keep the wires turned the way they originally were and just wiggled them back and forth a little until they found a home. After I got them all changed, I went back over the cap to make sure none of the wires were pinched or rubbing wrong. One other thing was, I never put the wire rails (the brackets that hold them apart and off the engine) back on until I had finished mounting them on the cap. 3 months later, no problems, but I'll let you know if something comes up.

 

I guess I don't feel so bad, that I had too much time invested in mine also!

 

I did not re-install the heat sheildseither. I will keep an eye on things, if I start to see a problem, I may soak them in Kerosene and wire wheel them inside and out. This will probably be the last Distributor I ever install. My 05 Yukon XL has those ignition packs.

BTW, the guys who say they can do this in 30min are full of crap.

 

LOL. Yeah, I lied to my brother about the time I spent, and I justified it to myself as "being picky" about the wire routing! This is too funny. Yeah, the heat shields went by the wayside, I don't think the MSD 8 MM's will fit in them anyway, and as a matter of fact, the MSD boots actually touchmy header flanges so I know they wont even work with my headers anyway.

 

Just because somehting is difficult doesn't make it impossible to do. I can and have changed the cap,rotor, wires, and plugs in my Ram in less than an hour. The plugs took most of that time. I've never been concerned about the one at a time swap as I am confident that I can remember 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2 as the firing order, the cap is marked number 1, and the distributor turns clockwise. I just pull everything off, match the old and new wires on the workbench, instal the new cap and rotor, and then have at the wires starting with number 1. I've not timed myself, but I'm sure I could do it in less than 30 minutes.

 

True dat! The location of the Dodge distributor is a royal booger. When I had to align the rotor with the CYL #1 mark on the body I had to use a mirror and a small screwdriver to achieve the proper alignment as I didn't want to have to pull the distributor.

 

Yeah, the swap thing really slowed me down, thats why Igave up on it. I think I got the passenger side plugs in and out with the silver anti-seize in less than 10 minutes. I was very careful with the drivers side plugs. They should come out better next time (no anti seize or liquid wrench on the threads, 73k miles). I actually had to use a breaker bar on #5. I just kept flexing it until it started moving.

 

Every Spring, and sometimes in the Fall, I pull my plugs just to check them out and re-gap them. I do this for two reasons, first I am running the MSD6AL ignition system which burns up plugs faster than the factory ignition does, and second because they never get the chance to set like concrete if I'm pulling them that often. The only time I've ever had plug problems is when I've let the plugs in for a couple years. No matter the engine, they are always a PITA after that amount of time.

Glad to hear that you got yours out with breaking/stripping/causing long lasting issues with them.