I have one of these. It is the same thing as the Dyna one. Look at jireh to get them pretty cheap. It is essentially a rebranded Dyna 2000i I believe.

 

As previously mentioned heat is a killer of electronics. Crane did get a bad batch of ignitions and that did tarnish their reputation. The original Crane was state of the art when they came out, but were dated after the computer tunable ones were released. Crane recently released a newer version of their ignition, but we haven't seen one yet. WQe use the Ultima programable ignitions now. They are priced right and programable to boot.
You can make any nosecone ignition last longer by spacing the cover out just a little bit so that air can move a little. Don't space it too much or you can get water, etc in there. Making sure that he cam bushing is clearanced properly will reduce heat along with running the lightest valve spring pressure your cam will allow. Hope this helps.
John

 

There are two different styles of the crane HI-4, one with the plate designed to mount in the cone. The second uses the OEM internals in the cone and plugs directly in to where your original ignition module would. On my Dyna, the OEM ignition module is located under the seat and is simply replaced with the crane module. I'm unsure where your OEM ignition module may be located but I'm certain someone will point you in the right direction shortly.

 

My hi-4E is mounted on the neck of the frame in front of the gas tank on my 1990 FLHS.

 

John, from MIACYCLES sold me the frame mounted model a couple of years ago when I went through my ignition problem by replacing everything one step at a time from the least expensive relay, then the coil, then the pickup (latest model is a solid state device), and then I was able to borrow a stock version that pointed toward my issue, an intermittent stock ignition module.

The Crane HI4E has several switching adjustments that really gave me better response and performance than stock. I'm not sure for my bike that I'd go to a computer set up style module but anything other than stock has many advantages.

Glad the problems of those days is over. Driving for miles and having the bike die over and over was a real pisser!

I consider John to be a real good hearted man. His help and friendly conversation when I was in a very fowl mood over the issue was just the help I needed.

 

Well now seeing the forest through all the trees, I do believe I am contributing to the problem. I am running a Thunder Header exhaust and after looking at it, both header pipes wrap around 3/4ths of the cone I'm sure causing a lot of heat to the ignition with little air cooling. So I guess I'll wrap the pipe to cool the area by the ignition cone.... Hopefully that solves my problem.

 

Often when they go intermittent they become unreliable even under normal conditions.

What I'd suggest is to place the pickup sensor back into the nosecone and use a frame mounted ignition module. That really keeps the "brain" away from possible heat damage.

Good luck whatever way you go.