My '83 280zx stopped running in October and I finally got it into the dealership. They said I have a problem with my Electronic Ignition Control Unit. Is this a straight old school ECU or something different. I was able to find the part on zstore.com but its a little pricey. http://www.thezstore.com/page/TZS/PROD/SEIC01A/12-4016
does anyone know where to find one cheaper or had a similar problem?

 

So you need the ECU, or ignitor?

The ECU is located at the drivers kick panel and controls the fuel injection. The ignitor is a little two-prong black box on the side of the n/a distributor. You can grab an ignitor from a junk yard from $free 99$ to probably $20. Heck, you could probably score two or three just in case.

 

The ignitor is usually just a driver transistor like the ones used on the turbo coils (and is mounted on the coil bracket for the turbo cars). The NA has an ignition module which converts the reluctor signal from the dizzy to basically an on/off signal that fires the coil (whereas the turbo ECU sends a signal to the ignitor to fire the coil). It's just semantics but it might help you when you're trying to track down the part.

 

Crazy! I clicked on the link for MSA that's crazy! You can buy a whole ZX dizzy with the module for $100-150 on the forums.

rockauto.com has them for $100+