Mailing List flyrotary@lancaironline.net Message #47283
From: Ed Anderson <eanderson@carolina.rr.com>
Subject: RE: [FlyRotary] More EC2 Tuning - Less progress - need help/ideas
Date: Sun, 19 Jul 2009 20:36:22 -0400
To: 'Rotary motors in aircraft' <flyrotary@lancaironline.net>

Mike,

 

Sounds the A controller has a major problem.  If you feel comfortable taking the Ec2 out of its box, you might check to see that the A controller chip is seated firmly in its PLCC socket.  One individual recently reported finding one of the chips not completely seated.  That might account for the drastic difference between the two controllers.

 

Ed

 


From: Rotary motors in aircraft [mailto:flyrotary@lancaironline.net] On Behalf Of Mike Fontenot
Sent: Sunday, July 19, 2009 6:52 PM
To: Rotary motors in aircraft
Subject: [FlyRotary] More EC2 Tuning - Less progress - need help/ideas

 

Hi all,

Hope the summer has been going well for the rest of you. I had a detour in my EC2 tuning, but am back at it.

Summary: EC2 on A controller has the engine surging at just about all RPMs I could manage to attain. Kind of a "rummm.... rummmm..... rummm..".  I could only get the RPMs up to around 1800 (out of a 5600 max) and the engine is knocking and banging, and even making a 'pffffut' kind of noise. Sounded like air or something.  Maybe coolant spewing out, because at the end of my session today I did find coolant on the ground, from my overflow tank.  Not smooth at all and I was afraid of losing parts! off the engine! Really rough, never develops much power. 

However, when I flip to the B controller it runs great. Very smooth, responsive, no surging at all. I can run the engine through the full range of RPM.  I noticed that a MAP of 22 is at about 5200 RPM.  In may I got to around 4700 at a MAP of 22. I noted this because I was going to start with Mode 3 programming (at MAP 22). I could not get anywhere near MAP 22.

Background: I had been making progress getting the EC2 tuned in May and early June. The A controller worked fine but the B controller would not function and the engine would die. TC had me remove the EC2 and send it back to him. He did find problems with the B side and repaired it. And set all the programming back to the defaults.

I have dual crank position sensors, one dedicated to A controller, and one dedicated to the B controller. TC was kind enough to make the repairs before his trip to Colorado in mid-June. I got the unit back, reinstalled it last weekend, fired the engine up for a quick test last Tuesday night. Then yesterday (Saturday) I just ran the engine in my driveway for about an hour, playing with different settings. This is really when I noticed the engine running rough on A.

I had recorded some of the values (mode 3/Mode 2) from the May tuning sessions. I reset mode 3 to that same setting (203) but it made no difference, engine rough.

I swapped the crank sensor connections (A controller to B cps, and B controller to A cps), made no different. A was rough and B was smooth as a baby's behind.

I have an EM2, but as I understand things, the EM2 really can only see values of the A controller. Even when flipped to B.  And there is no way to back-copy from B to A. It is always A to B. Grrrrr

I also instaled a wideband O2 sensor for the purpose of tuning. That seemed to work OK, but I never really got a chance to use it.

So... I really need some ideas, suggestions, insights of what to try next.

--
Mike

================================
Mike Fontenot
Apex Consulting & Services LLC
Lakewood, Colorado
303 / 731-6645
mikef AT apexconsultingservices DOT com
================================

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