Still plodding along down here in Houston trying to
develop my 13b. It is starting up with some difficulty when I first get to
the hangar and running more smoothly as I ease my way through the auto program
routines. I spent Tuesday and Wednesday (my weekend) doing a lot of "I
gotta get back to that" tasks and made some wire connections permanent, secured
my panel <g>(...even if fiberglass, it is a pain to work with a
floppy panel), replaced some wires (my oil temp wire was toast....thus causing
44 degrees to read for oil temp on the EM with no change. It is
reading true now that that one pesky little wire has been replaced and
rerun.
I am still having problems with Controller
"B". When I switch from A to B, the engine seems to want to stall, since
the engine will not restart for a few hours (so far) after a run I flip back to
A before this happens. At higher RPM I can make the switch between
controllers and it does not stall, but runs significantly rougher. Could
this just be due to the Auto Program refinements not yet being transferred to
"B"?
After my various efforts of the last few days I
decided to run some base diagnostics on the machine since I had made so many
little changes/improvements(?) over the last few days. Meaning I did the
diagnostic modes on the coils and the injectors. When I first arrived I
started the engine and started tweaking and testing. One of the test I
performed was to disable the primaries and secondary's in succession. When
I disable the secondary's I did not notice any change in the way the engine
sounded, but when I disable the primaries the engine would start to shut
down...so I quickly flipped the switch back up to the on position to avoid the
shut down. I did this a few more times over the next couple of minutes
with the same results. Hmmmmm. Anyway, I decided to put this to the
side for a moment and I pushed the throttle to WOT. WOW, the temps rose
pretty darn quickly at full throttle.....the temps were staying around 150 ish
at idle and the lower RPM, but really soared at full tilt. The displayed
RPM on the EM are still jumping all over the place since I have not addressed
this issue as of yet....flickers from 2000, to 4800, to 1200 back to 2000, to
4900 ish with a few numbers in what I think in the correct range predominating
the various numbers. I was a bit disappointed that the highest number I
saw with WOT was only about 4999 ish. Seems low. Is the fact the
engine only has a few hours on it and or is still not tweaked a reason for this,
or is this expected sitting half in, half out of the hangar....yeah, the prop
bit is outside in the sunshine <g>?
Finally, for tonight anyway, back to the
injectors. After my data gathering run was complete I went to the
diagnostic mode on the ECU. When I tested the injectors as if they were
firing at 3000 rpm I disable the primaries and could clearly hear the
secondary's clicking away from inside the cabin. When I disabled the
secondary's I couldn't hear anything until I stuck my head outside the
cabin. When I went around to the engine I could clearly hear the primaries
clicking away, but at a MUCH reduced volume of the secondary's. Does this
matter. Do the two different types have this significant of a sound
difference? Could this explain the about mentioned shutting down with the
injectors were turned off during the engine run?
As always guys, thanks for your kind
considerations. As I have mentioned before all commentary is
welcome. I am not insulted by the most basic suggestions and
observations. I am way to close to it at times to notice the obvious but
open enough to learn what I didn't even know I didn't know.
Eventually I may get over the sensation that every
time I run the thing, let alone run it at high RPM, that I am doing some great
harm as opposed to just be pleased and amazed that this engine Dave Staten and I
built actually runs at all.
Like my messy and cluttered hangar....these messy
and cluttered emails are signs of PROGRESS (yeah, that's it)
All the best,
Chris