Your opinion on coil packs

[Drakelee]

simply enough I want to get rid of the stock coils, should I drop the cash on an aftermarket brand or do the ls2 conversion? I'v read up on most of the pros and cons but still cant decide. I would go ls2 but I have no way to adjust the dwell (or dosnt that really matter?) any way what are you guys running and how is it working out? thanks for any helpful words!!

pretty much stock RB20 s13

[Carl H]

Dwell time can be adjusted with a romtuned ecu for the ls2 coils.
I can do a romtuned ecu for a mild bolton setup with ls2 coils, email for more info.

[Drakelee]

Carl I PMd you before making this post, I dunno if you got it? whats your email? I will PM you again.. thanks

[Darius]

You won't have to adjust the dwell time for the LS2 coils. I ran mine on stock settings for a while before actually adjusting the dwell and it ran perfectly fine. The stock settings are conservative i.e. short dwell.

[Cjmartz2k]

Why do you want to get rid of the stock coils? Are you currently having an issue? If you think you are upgrading anything power wise on your stock RB20, you aren't. Stock RB coils (any of them) are good to at least 600hp and 2.0 bar of boost reliably over several years of abusive driving.

Now if you are using the LS coil swap as a good option to fix broken/missing coil packs and the normal "tape them up" and "clean out the brass spring seat" mods don't work, I can understand that completely.

[Drakelee]

Yeah I'm replacing do to the car breaking up at about 10-12psi sorry I didn't mention that before.

[l0nestar]

Yeah I'm replacing do to the car breaking up at about 10-12psi sorry I didn't mention that before.

That's not necessarily a coil pack problem; but an underlying issue.

[Drakelee]

True but I figur I have to start somewhere even if it isn't the packs then at least I have a solid set up for the future. At this point I guess I am assuming that's what the prob is but I havnt had a lot of time to troubleshoot through other possibilities.

[Cjmartz2k]

Well, you are starting trouble shooting with the most expensive and difficult to do (if you go to LS coils) thing. Try changing the plugs, and while you are doing that, follow one or more of the write ups on here about wrapping your coils with electrical tape or paint them in liquid tape and clean the spring bucket with a dremel. Throw all of that back together and see what you get.

BTW--if you have jacked up plugs, even LS coils might not be able to fire them.

[Drakelee]

Thanks for all the input guys, i just got new plugs and will be putting them in this weekend, to be honest I really don’t want to ghetto rig my coils haha if they are s*** then I personally don’t want them in my car (no offence to anyone who has gone that route) I will do some messing around this weekend but I'm thinking of going ls2 either way...mainly because they are cheaper to replace Individually if need so be, less to worry about in the long run.

[Tenchuu]

A quick once over on breakup under boost (assumes stock ECU, timing set correctly and fuel pressure set correctly with FPR):

1. (for me anyways with crappy manual boost controller that creeps up) check that boost is not spiking over 10-11PSI MAX. I shoot for 10 with stock ECU. any more and my ECU pulls R&R on me. I end up making far more power (and reliably) at 8-10 than 11-12 because of that.
2. check plugs
2.5 while you are in there, clean brass/tape coilpacks
3. MAF solder gets dry and cracks over the years. open up and re-solder MAF connection

if not these then look into:
Ignitor/Coilpacks/ less likley: MAF