Since the Buick V6 that is in the Jeep originally came with a points distributor, which is older technology and requires much more maintenance and is inferior to an electronic High Energy Ignition (HEI), and the fact that I failed my emissions test, I decided to upgrade to the HEI distributor. I found a good deal in an online classified, so $60 later I had a used distributor and new 8mm plug wires shipped to my door.
Not to get too detailed on the install, but we had to make a few modifications to get the distributor to work. Since the HEI takes up more room I had to grind some meat off the front of the intake manifold, replace an intake bolt with a button head bolt to gain even more room, and grind off some meat on the distributor cap to get it to work. I also had problems with getting the HEI to fire on more than 3 cylinders. It took us hours before we found that the distributor cap was 90 degrees off of where it should be on the distributor
housing. Once we made the modifications to rotate the cap to the correct alignment she fired right up and was firing on all 6 cylinders. After a few minutes of adjusting the timing the engine was running better than it ever has. The engine no longer missed and it seemed to have more power than ever.
I don't have a before picture of the distributor, but here is the after pic of the HEI install:
