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From: "George Lendich" <lendich@aanet.com.au>
To: "Rotary motors in aircraft" <flyrotary@lancaironline.net>
References: <list-3984751@logan.com>
Subject: Re: [FlyRotary] Need a sanity check
Date: Tue, 24 Nov 2009 16:43:49 +1000
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Steve,
I had a similar problem on a motorbike and it turned out to be a broken 
earth cable and it worked intermittently, couldn't see the break because of 
the sheath /cover.
George ( down under)

>I have been working on an issue for three weeks now, with very intermittent 
>spark when cranking the engine.  Needless to say, it won't start either.
> I have a spark plug out of each rotor, and have them clamped to a good 
> ground, so that I can see a spark on the front and rear rotor.
> If i rotate the CAS by hand, or turn the prop by hand, I get good spark. 
> When cranking with the starter, I get an initial spark, and then an 
> occasional spark on the front or rear rotor.  Interesting, when I let off 
> the starter, I get a couple of good sparks as it coasts to a stop.  Both 
> controllers do the same thing BTW.
>
> I had emailed Tracy, as at one time I thought that the EC-2 had an issue. 
> Tracy said that he had seen this symptom a couple of times before, and it 
> is caused by noise from the starter interfering with the CAS signal.  He 
> suggested that I install a 1K resistor across each of the crank angle 
> sensors.  I installed the resistors, but it did not cure the problem.
>
> This morning, determined to get to the bottom of this, I removed the 
> battery cable running to the starter, and using a spare battery, and a 
> jumper cable for the ground, I cranked the starter with this battery, 
> which was isolated from the airplanes electrical system.  It had good 
> spark on both rotors .... yeah !!!
>
> So then, I decided to reroute the starter cable on the other side of the 
> engine, which keeps it away from the other wiring.  I hooked it back up to 
> the aircraft battery, crossed my fingers and cranked the started.  Same 
> problem.   I thought that perhaps the noise was getting into the EC-2, so 
> I put the spare battery in the back seat (pusher aircraft), and using some 
> jumper clips, I hooked the EC-2 through a fuse to the isolated battery. 
> Same problem.
>
> I had extended the CAS wiring when I replaced the engine, so I decided to 
> reroute the shielded CAS wiring, so that I could eliminate the unshielded 
> wires, which were about 12" long.  Same problem.
>
> I am struggling with what to try next.  This problem started before I 
> swapped the engine, as it was very hard to get started, though for three 
> years prior to that, I had no issues, and it started easily.
>
> Has anyone else seen this type of problem, or have any suggestions ?
>
> Steve Brooks
> Cozy MKIV 13BT
>
>
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