Dial-Back Timing Light suggestions

[Wayne M.]

Well, in 30 hours I'll be heading out from Calgary to New Joisy in the wife's '92 Mustang to pick up a set of tires and a couple of Muncies (removed the rear seat). EBay purchases that are too bulky/heavy to safely ship to Canada; besides, I enjoy the open road.

If timing [no pun] and pocketbook allow, I'd like to purchase a dial-back timing light. Thinking of something compact and not too "Buck Rogers"-ish in appearance. What stores would stock this item, and what I should pay for a quality product ? Make and model #s would be appreciated.

TIA

[Robert E.]

Re: Dial-Back Timing Light suggestions

Hi Wayne,

That's some drive you've got in front of you. I bought this timing light from Canadian Tire a couple of years ago and it seems to work great. Have a peek at the link below.

Robert




Canadian Tire Timing Light

[Joel Falk]

Re: Dial-Back Timing Light suggestions

Wayne,

I bought a nice one from Sears. I believe it is made by Actron despite the Craftsman branding.

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr/produ...TOOL&ihtoken=1

Joel

[Mike M.]

Re: Dial-Back Timing Light suggestions

I also bought mine at Canadian Tire. I've had it for about 15 years now and it works great no problems. It's not the best but it does the job.

[Clem Z.]

i would never trust a dial back if you are doing

performance tuning. you are better off marking off the damper in degrees and setting the timing at max RPM the advance stops advancing. that way you know the timing will never be over advanced. speed shops sell a very nice timing light that operates on 2 "D" cells and that way you do not need to look for a 12 volt power source to hook up to,just clamp the inductive pickup around the plug wire and check the timing JMHO

[John H.]

Re: Dial-Back Timing Light suggestions

Wayne -

I have an Actron CP-7519 dial-back light I've had for about five years - about $75.00 from www.actron.com; works great, and shows exactly the same readings as my neighbor's Snap-On dial-back light, at 1/5 the price. Actron also makes the Craftsman dial-back light (same guts, different housing).

[Duke W.]

Re: i would never trust a dial back if you are doi

I've got a Sears/Acton dial back light and a very precisely measured 30 deg. mark on the balancer, and the light is right on the money, but I have used borrowed dial-backs (can't remember the brands) in past years that weren't very accurate, but I recall that a Snap-On was right on the money.

I agree that all should have at least one mark in the 30-36 degree range to use as an accuracy check, and a good time to do this is whenever the balancer is off the engine. Then you can use a protractor to make an accurate mark.

Duke

[Clem Z.]

you can mark the damper in degrees with

it on the engine. just use the chord of the angle of the damper diameter and mark it off using a pair of machinist dividers. also a simple way is 36 degrees is 1/10 of 360 degrees so measure the circumference of the damper with a tape and divide by 10. i never trust the dial back that they went back to "0" if you power timed the engine. JMHO

[Phil P.]

Re: Dial-Back Timing Light suggestions

some dial back t lights will blank out (no strobe) at higher rpms---i too use a sears dial back---have used it on 360 degreed dampners and found it very accurate

[Wayne M.]

Thanks, All --- I've taken notes *NM*