How To Advance Your Ignition Timing For Great Performance Gains

Advancing your ignition timing is the free and easy mod that you can do in minutes. Before we go into how to do the mod, let’s quickly discuss what advancing your timing actually means…

What is it?

Advancing your ignition timing means that the spark plug fires the air-fuel mixture in the cylinder earlier (measured in degrees Before Top Dead Centre) than it does out of the factory. This gives an engine greater performance because it forces the piston in the cylinder back down harder (because the spark was energised sooner) after it has reached top dead centre (TDC).

Retarding the ignition timing means that the spark has less time to become energised Before Top Dead Centre (BTDC), and so the force with which the piston comes back down after it has reached TDC is reduced. This means that you will lose performance, and nobody wants that to happen (except the cops).

How do you advance ignition timing?

One of the easiest cars to advance ignition timing on is the Mazda MX-5, so we’ll use this as a guide. The tools you’ll need are a couple of spanners, some wire, a screw driver and, importantly, an inductive timing light.

A general rule of thumb is that you can advance the ignition timing of most cars with a distributor cap, including older Hondas and VWs.

The first step in advancing your ignition timing is to dive underneath the bonnet to locate the diagnostics box. For the purposes of these steps, I’ll be using the images from a very helpful guide uploaded onto MX-5 Nutz.

Once the diagnostics box has been located, open it up and connect the TEN and Ground (GND) pins using a piece of wire (this puts the computer into diagnostics mode, a trick that essentially makes the car learn).

The next step is to locate your idle adjustment screw (as above) and lower your idle to 850rpm. Following this step, you need to hook up your inductive timing light - one connector goes to the #1 HT lead, and the other goes to a power supply. If your battery is in the boot like with the MX-5, then clamping to the rear of the alternator is a good substitute for power. Finally, hook up your ground lead to a metal bracket on the engine.

Next up, you need to locate the cam angle sensor (CAS) which is held in place with a bolt (in this case a 12mm). Loosen the bolt by no more than a turn to ensure that you have free movement of it when using the timing light.

Now, you turn on the car, locate the crank pulley (aka harmonic balancer) which sits adjacent to a bracket with the timing marks you’ll need. On the MX-5 image below, the longest timing mark line represents the factory pre set.

Shine the timing light onto the bracket with the timing marks and very carefully rotate the cam angle sensor (CAS) until you hit the desired angle (in this case two notches to the left which means you’ve hit 14 degrees).

All you need to do now is to tighten the cam angle sensor bolt back up and check that the angle still reads 14 degrees. Then you’re done!

Remember to do your research before changing the ignition timing of your car, including locating your cam angle sensor, crank pulley and timing marks and diagnostics box. Make sure you’re also aware of the extent at which you can change the ignition timing. Change your ignition too much and your engine could suffer from knock, which ruins the combustion and could fry your motor!

Take a look at this detailed guide on MX-5 Nutz for more information.