Should an 8 mustang dist. have a shorter oil pump shaft?
 

I took my 79 distributor and my 91 distributor to a machine shop to have the gears swapped and it turned out that the 91 steel gear has a larger diameter hole in it than the iron gear. I said to heck with it and ordered a remanufactured dist from napa for an 85 mustang , I specified steel gear for it. The dist I got looks exactly like my 79 dist: It's smaller, takes the tall cap with the female sockets on top and...this is what bothers me.... has a shorter oil pump shaft. Now I know it engages the oil pump because I see the oil pressure go up when I start the car. Should I be concerned? Also, what does a steel gear look like. It seems to look exactly like the iron gear on the old distributor (stupid question, I know, but the 91 steel gear is...well.... beefier looking)

As far as I know you shouldn't change the material of the distributor gear. It will rapidly increase the wear rate of the parts. I remember a big discussion about this a while back...ah, here it is.

http://forums.mustangworks.com/showt...stributor+gear

Good luck,

Rich D.

yea you need the 85 4bbl 5spd dist..and tell em you want the steel gear when the ask..if you dont use the steel gear it WILL explode the first timre you powershift it or really beet the snot out of it

they prolly gave you the wrong one

oops, sorry. Here's the background: I'm doing a carb swap into a 91 mustang, so I'm running a roller cam by default. Some dude sent me a 79 distributor when I ordered an 85 distributor. I noted the iron gear and grabbed my stock 91 dist to go have the gears swapped and then I noticed all the things in the post. I read the post you suggested and it looks like I could run at least 10-20K miles before I toast it at least. I'm just worried because the machine shop guy noticed how much shorter the 85 distributor oil pump shaft is than the stock 91 distributor and mentioned that I might not be engaging the OP shaft all the way

WOW!

I guess the napa guys gave me a dizzy with an iron gear. I SHAVED the gear halfway to pieces in just 2 crankings. Thank God that the cam gear looks completely unharmed (by flashlight inspection). I poured some oil in there to wash all the debris down into the pan. This distributor swap thing is turning into a horrendous nightmare!