[Andy Lawton]

Thanks Paul.

I think I will go the 123 route. I suppose the one to get is the DS-R with the angled cap?

[Andy Lawton]

Pertronix Europe are based in the UK. They gave me the link to their French distributor. http://www.classicautoelec.com/

They were very good, and dispatched a SV-141 quickly. Sadly, it doesn’t fit. I have the cassette type points, and this was for the conventional sort. I then asked if they have a 123 Dizzy for my DY3 engine, to which they replied that it wasn’t the original engine. I beg to differ. The DY3 was installed in the DSuper from 1972, if my research is correct.

So a question: I think distributors are, in general, interchangable between engines of the same type. This of course isn’t universally true but what distributor could I use? The reason I ask is that I’m prepared to bite the bullet and get a 123, but of course I need to know if the drive will fit! Does anyone have any information that could help? My distributor is an A251, DY010A and from what I have read, this is the same as the 4291B.

123 say that the DS-R is suitable for the 4291A and 4291B, so I’m pretty sure that this is the correct one. Maybe.

Anyone got any ideas?

[Andy Lawton]

No luck. They don’t have anything 🙁

[Andy Lawton]

There is a Pertronix Europe, https://www.pertronixeurope.com/.

https://www.pertronixeurope.com/

[Andy Lawton]

Peter,

I can’t see anything for and French distributors. I’ve emailed them. I’m willing to be a testbed, if they want to! Their prices are far more sensible too.

[Andy Lawton]

Update:

So, with the help of Peter and his instructions, I have got all the indicators changed to LED with no load resistors and using a replacement LED 3 pin flasher unit.

I used Peter’s post as a guide, and followed the wiring from the switch through to behind the dashboard. I then wired the indicator bulbs to be in the same circuit as the relevant side indicators. Effectively they become like a pair of extra indicator bulbs. There’s no need for a separate feed for them now, so the middle pin of the original flasher unit is no longer needed. Now the dash shows which way you are indicating!

As the problem I had before with the LED flasher unit I bought was that there was no extra separate feed to the dash indicators, well, now that problem was eliminated as the dash indicators are part of the car indicator circuit. I could swap back the new LED flasher unit no problem, with the bonus of being able to remove the load resistors.

I’ll replace the original hazard flasher with an LED solid state two pin one, as the hazards flash a bit too quickly. I did have one, but I blew it up …

There is a bit of a quirk now though. The hazard warning switch is a rocker switch where the normal position (hazards off) is when the switch is in the middle position. If you activate the hazards by pressing the top of the rocker switch, then the car indicators flash, along with both dash indicators. This is to be expected, as they are all in the same circuit. However the hazard warning light on the dash does not flash. If you activate the hazards by pressing the rocker switch at the bottom, then this works the same as pressing the top of the switch with the addition of the hazard warning light on the dash now flashing! I don’t really care about this though.

I don’t know why Citroen wired the dash indicator lights the way they did. They could have done it the way Peter said. It would have taken an extra 300mm or so of wire, and they could have gone from a 3 pin flasher unit to a 2 pin one, saving a bit of money. In fact a couple more bits of wire from the indicator switch to a simple rocker switch would have eliminated the need for a second dedicated flasher unit, and removed the need for a separate hazard warning light on the dash.

[Andy Lawton]

I have had a look at the Pertronix site, and it seems thay have products for the SEV distributor. It’s just a question of finding a European distributor (no pun intended).

[Andy Lawton]

Yes, I know about the 123 distrubutors – but they ain’t cheap.

[Andy Lawton]

Well I have come to the conclusion that using a different flasher unit is a definate no no. There’s nothing I can do to get one of the 3 pin devices to work properly. I’ve added a couple of load resistors instead. I didn’t want to do that, but there’s a lot of room behind the front indicators, and I have a bunch of high wattage resistors kicking around. Seems to work OK.

[Andy Lawton]

Ah, good to know. Thanks for the info.

[Andy Lawton]

Thanks Peter. My indicator lights on the dash do flash together instead of individually left and right. Initially I thought this was a problem!

It might be a bit more complicated for me as I already have hazards.

[Andy Lawton]

Paul,

Using the good old multimeter, I can see that one of the connections on the flasher unit goes to ground (or a low resistance) when the indicator switch is in either the left or right position. When the indicator stalk is in the off position, the resistance is infinite. So it looks like the flasher unit feeds the +12V through the unit, and to the bulbs that way. The third connection is to the indicator repeater bulbs in the binnacle on the dashboard. I checked this by feeding 12V down this connection and the bulbs on the dash lit up.

The hazard warning switch appears to be a Citroen part. It seems to be a factory fit.

The reason I was looking at this is two fold. the car had a towbar on it. I have removed it, cut the loom, insulated the ends of the wires and tied the wiring up in a waterproof bad, tucking it out of the way. It seems on first glance that the wiring was done by just splicing in to the wires to the sidelights, indicators and reversing lights. There’s no evidence of the towbar wiring going further forwards in the car. I just wanted to check this was the case, so I thought it would be a good idea to take a look at the flasher unit.

The other reason was that I wanted to fit LED indicator bulbs. I could add resistors, but I would prefer just to replace the indicator unit with an electronic one. I did this on my S2000, and it worked perfectly.

I suppose that the addition of a towbar may have required the modification of the flasher circuit, but I don’t think so. The flasher unit is an original, as is the two pin hazard unit.

The existing wiring could use a two pin flasher unit, by just connecting the cable for the dash repeater lights to the cable that connects to the indicators on the car. Most of the spares suppliers seem to supply three pin units. These will work in place of a two pin – you just don’t use the pin that is for the repeater dash lights.

Maybe, as you said, I have an option for hazards and that’s why it doesn’t appear in the standard wiring diagrams.

[Andy Lawton]

Thanks for the link Paul.

All the diagrams show a two pin indicator/flasher unit. I have two units – a 3 pin that seems to handle the left/right indication, and a two pin that handles the hazard warning lights. When I look on the earlier diagrams (1969), I can see that they use a 3 pin. Very odd.

[Andy Lawton]

The reason I had a go was a) just to see if I could improve on the original idea and b) to improve the filtering. I’m sure that a modern air filter is far better at flowing air and filtering out particles than a 50 year old design. If the original design was better, I’m sure that cars would still be using it. It is more cost efficient now to use a disposable filter as the labour cost is far less and I agree, it doesn’t apply to most DS owners, as the time is theirs. But even so, I would think the performance is better. The old filter just fit’s straight back in, so it’s completely backwards compatible.

[Andy Lawton]

I think that is the same filter in the video, just from another manufacturer. They do just drop straight in, but I didn’t see any way that they would be held in contact with the bottom part of the air filter. As far as I could see, they would just rattle around in there, and air could possibly bypass it. Also, the original air filter gasket doesn’t fit around the filter – well at least mine didn’t. Also there was no way to fit the gasket separating the top and bottom parts of the filter body on it’s own. It’s too small. The original filter stretches it to be the right size to fit. That’s why I made my “hoop” – to increase the size of the gasket to be the same as the original filter does, and also to have something to push the new filter down, so no air can escape past it.

[Author]

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