TEC (Ignition System)

[Utgarhoth at aol.com]

>I missed the thread of this system. Can you tell me more about it? I have a
'63 Chevy >Impala SS that I'm making grandoise plans for..

Electromotive makes and sells a crank-triggered multi-coil ignition system.
 For V-8 applications, it uses 4 coils, one coil for every 2 cylinders.  That
gives the coil a much longer time to saturate than a typical single coil
ignition system, typically resulting in greater spark energy.  In a 4
cylinder engine, the same system can be used with a single coil per cylinder.
 I believe they also make a 3 coil model for 3 cylinder and 6 cylinder
applications.  Basically the same ignition system is used in their fuel
injection driver, but the Coronet's fuel injection is being handled by a
Haltech box, hence no need for the full TEC injection/ignition system.

After working for some time in the engine compartment of a '66 Coronet,
particularly mounting the multi-coil ignition and wiring it it, I was
astonished to find an item of virtually the same size and shape mounted under
the hood of a brand new Aurora on the sales floor of a GM dealer!  I just
assumed that GM had bought the rights to the design from Electromotive, but
that may not be the actual case after all.  For American cars, I am much more
knowlegeable about Mopar engines and cars than GM, so I'm quickly headed into
a grey area here speculating about the GM designs.  Maybe someone who knows
more about GM and GM electronics can offer some more input into this
discussion.  

My comment came about someone mentioning a lawsuit between Electromotive and
GM over their multi-coil ignition system.   Maybe I should have included a
bit more detail.
Unfortunately I wiped out all my old mail messages and I'm not sure about the
start of the thread either.  Anyway, it's probably not that important.