Hey, everyone

I'll try to make this as short as possible, but there is a lot that has gone on in the past couple of days between me and various people of 123ignition so I will try my best. 

I will post copies of a pdf file containing the emails between the various employees of this company. I am pointing out now that I have intermediate experience in mechanics and engine building but there is a lot for me to learn still. This isn't really much of discussion on the fundamentals of timing, installation, etc. This is more so a post regarding quality of a product and quality of customer service. I ultimately don't want people to make the same mistake I made. I understand this can be a difficult situation for both parties and I will get more into that later.

Okay, moving forward. I recently installed a 260z 123ignition programmable bluetooth distributor. With this unit I purchased the coil of their recommendation, along with plugs and spark plug wires. This was to be installed two weeks before my vacation so I could have time to fine tune it and get ready for a big drive ahead. I made a post a week or so ago that I was hearing noises under the hood which was confirmed to be the water pump. I documented healthy compression and no damage to rod bearings at that time. The 123ignition is a pretty straight forward install, though they do not state that you need a timing light for this to be installed properly. You do. I have one and used one but the instructions state you rotate the distributor according to the direction your rotor within the cap rotates and stop once a light illuminates within the distributor. There is a small window you'd get this correct without a timing light. Other customers had this problem.

After installation is complete the car starts up no problem once timing is set. At this point I started having trouble with the app and that it had trouble reading the stock curve information from the app from time to time. This is not much of a problem as information is stored internally within the distributor. I take the car for a drive. Mapped out it was only an 8 minute drive. Within that small time frame, my cruising speed was cut prematurely by the smell of smoke. As I pulled over the engine was struggling to run. The app at this point was telling me there was no vacuum advance. Luckily I wasn't far from home and made it back.

Then my communication with the company begins. I will not post that here as it will be posted in a pdf link for everyone to read below. These emails mostly are asking information about their design of their product so I can get a better understanding of what may have happened. Did it lose vacuum? I just measured healthy compression a week ago, why would shortly after my drive a piston burn up? Issues within the distributor? Maybe this piston was on it's way out already? Both possible and I agreed that there were too many variables to prove. You can see in the emails at one point I tried to diffuse the situation before tensions got high and just stated I would like a refund. The conversation was continued by the director of this company, Ron, and that ultimately I was just trying to scam him. Fast forward and Ron has lost all contact with me. I was to deal with the person I bought it from. Fair enough. I spoke with Ed. Now Ed is a pretty nice guy and even after all this I do believe he is. Ed confirms that there is too many variables and again, I agree, hesitantly. I was told to package it and send it back for a refund in which I, of course, agreed. Upon getting ready for packaging and removing a bracket you must install to mount the distributor I heard something rattling in the inside. I remove the cap to find the coil contact had broken off completely. In that process caused marring inside of the cap meaning it bounced around a bit before falling to the bottom. Whether that can cause problems with misfires? You be the judge of that. It leads me to my point of the multiple times it lost advance in a 20 minute window. Roughly the combined time of adjustments at idle and the first and final test run. How can I be confident that the internals of this distributor can do it's intended purpose whenever the distributor cap can only do it's purpose for 8 minutes? I sent this photo to Ed and Ed did not respond. I called after almost a full business day in which Ed admitted that he did see the photo. Ed reassured me that what happened is normal to happen to a distributor. 

We can also note from the emails that after asking 3 times how these distributors work, my suspicions were confirmed that if this product was to fail electronically that it loses all advance. Not a terribly huge problem but this is where I'm starting to have more faith in old 40+ year distributors over a shiny new one. 

Ending this I feel sorry for Ed. If I were in his shoes I wouldn't know what to do either. You can only do so much in this situation, I guess. I certainly don't know if I would have went with his route in saying "well, I normally charge a restocking fee but I'm waiving that for you." I understand we install aftermarket parts at our own risks. Seeing as I am, I don't know, the 1% I can see how it can be chalked up to user error. After the facts I do disagree and I do think the product is at fault. Do I expect anyone to help replace my engine? No. It'd be nice to cover some cost of it but I'd prefer to replace my engine because of my own stupidity and mistakes. Not someone else's. 

This may rub some people the wrong way. I'm sure some with a good experience with Ed will try to blame me. I don't care honestly. I can't gain anything from this at this point. I just want to share my story and hopefully prevent anyone from doing the same.

If you spent the time to read this, thank you. 

The pdf is only edited to remove all personal information of both parties and to condense. There is a lot of quotes and signatures in the original. It's still a nightmare but only 4 pages and will revise later. Sorry about the watermarks.

123.pdf

Edited May 23, 20195 yr by Rill Cosby

Fighting the world's irrationality, one simple internet post at a time...

How do we tell who wins this conversation?   I win if you find a problem that is not timing related.  You win if nobody ever buys a 123 distributor again.  I'm rooting for me.

4 minutes ago, Zed Head said:

How do we tell who wins this conversation?   I win if you find a problem that is not timing related.  You win if nobody ever buys a 123 distributor again.  I'm rooting for me.

What do you mean? I've already won. It would help if you knew what we were competing for.

You made a dead topic "popular" and go from like 50 views to almost 200 views. One of the first things to pop up when researching this product. That could have made one person not buy this product, into possibly two, Hell, maybe three. I should be thanking you!

Edited May 23, 20195 yr by Rill Cosby

You're welcome, as is 123.  They make a good product, and, obliviously, by your firsthand account, stand behind it no matter how much abuse they take from customers.  That's a pretty good recommendation.  They should thank you.

Hmm, I don't think that's the vibe people are getting from this thread. Proven by almost everyone else who posted prior to you made a comment about that's how they shouldn't be running the show. If you stand behind them, without even reading the emails, how can you sit here and say they are a good company? You're part of the problem, my guy. 

The email is still there to view. I will mention again that in those emails before an argument even began and I quote "Also just to clarify, I'm not looking to get anything out of this. It puts me in a horrible situation being my daily driver, but it is what it is. I'm just explaining my experience and I would hope at the minimum I could at least return the thing and get my money back."

In which the director sidestepped that and instigated. Why should that even happen?

I suspect there are lots of people like me that haven't gotten involved but still have a high opinion of 123 because I know people who have run them and like them.  It is unfortunate you have had a problem and others for that matter. The main take away I have so far is their supplied caps are suspect.

As for your engine damage, I would want alot more info before I blamed the distributor! Lots of other possibilities there before I would suspect timing. Now on a turbo application timing is more crucial but NA and strret compressions not so much. 

1 hour ago, Patcon said:

I suspect there are lots of people like me that haven't gotten involved but still have a high opinion of 123 because I know people who have run them and like them.  It is unfortunate you have had a problem and others for that matter. The main take away I have so far is their supplied caps are suspect.

As for your engine damage, I would want alot more info before I blamed the distributor! Lots of other possibilities there before I would suspect timing. Now on a turbo application timing is more crucial but NA and strret compressions not so much. 

I agree. I know the majority have good experiences. There does seem to be a small trend among bluetooth models having more issues than the other programmable models, outside of the caps. But yes, the distributor cap seems to be the same in all setups and should be addressed.

I'm genuinely curious on to what other information you would like? I'm being serious because I would like to know as well to help pinpoint the issue, if even possible. It's a little different as I know the history of the vehicle so I'd be willing to share and that is why my mind is focused primarily on the timing being at fault. Because of one, the compression (before and after). Two, valve lash is correct. Three, no issues prior. I'd have to check the mileage but I'd say 15,000 miles ago this engine went through an entire rebuild. Only a little bit of head work but the bottom end was completely redone, timing kit as well. I'd like to think if it would have went bad, it would have went bad already. That's not necessarily true but man, what a terrible coincidence if it decided to now.

I will get to it soon to do a leak down test and at some point get inside to confirm or deny valves.

Edited May 23, 20195 yr by Rill Cosby

4 minutes ago, Rill Cosby said:

Because of one, the compression (before and after). 

Numbers are always good.  Report the numbers, then do the standard practice of adding oil to the cylinders to see if they help seal the rings.  If the oil helps you have a ring problem, if it doesn't you might have a valve problem.

And don't forget to open the throttle before cranking.  And remove all of the plugs so that you get some good engine speed.

Edited May 23, 20195 yr by Zed Head

I will double check soon. Numbers if I remember correctly were in the range of 170-180 before compression. I'd have to find the piece of cardboard if we are looking for exact. The lowest cylinder, that was not this one, I believe was roughly 168. 

The cylinder afterwards is 130-ish.

Edited May 23, 20195 yr by Rill Cosby

Zed's post on numbers, dry and wet is a good place to start.

What was the static compression on the rebuild? Peanut head or open head? Cast pistons? Detonation issues? Premium fuel?

I would pull the head and make pictures. Could be a burnt valve, broken rings, holed piston, bent valve. A number of things really...

It will be very interesting to see the leak down results and to tear down the head, 15,000 miles is just broken in, a mystery waiting to be solved.

Well, to not keep you guys waiting I went out and decided to do a dry and wet test.

Piston number 4 being the culprit in bold.

Dry - 173 - 175 -178 - 137 - 178 - 178

Wet - 182 - 185 - 187 - 166 - 185 - 185 

As far as tearing down the head that will be a little ways from now. If ever.