Plasma Ignition | Plasma Jet Ignition

[Aaron Murakami]

Aaron, there was never any doubt in my mind that you would get it going as I own several of your books and know a little about your mettle. We all lose our way from time to time, and as you pointed out you had already figured out what was going on, I just gave you a nudge confirming what you already knew. None of us are perfect this is why we collaborate and support each other in our community...

Sincerely. Longhorn

P.S. keep us posted on the performance of your plasma ignition system its output is circuitly exciting :-)

Thank you - to get the performance that I expect I'll have to modify the Mass Air Flow sensor and O2 sensors.

The MAF sensor I have is voltage regulated - the cooler the sensor gets, the more current can flow and the more fuel gets pumped... cooler is interpreted as more air flow. Many people are just putting in potmeters to lean it out - I'll probably try that first.

For the O2 sensor, I have 2 on the first cat right after the headers - will have to put on a typical EFIE circuit for each.

I do have a VOLO HHO chip wired into the OBDII, but that is calibrated to work with all stock settings so a maf and o2 mod will defeat it so I have to use one or the other. The Volo chip will only lean it out so much - not sure how it compares to tweaking the maf and o2 sensors.

I do have a obdii port bluetooth adapter and can look at some stats on my phone like o2 sensor voltages - slow and clunky but is all I have for now.

Last night was looking at the fuel injectors themselves... basically a spring loaded electromagnet that gets charged to pull the valve open... if I can figure out the exact signal going to the fuel injector - should be visible on a scope, then can probably make a circuit similar to an EFIE where it takes that voltage and simply reduces it x amount... if we can do that direct with the fuel injectors, then we should be able to have absolute control over the fuel settings no matter what the maf or o2 sensors see.

I know there are expensive software packages and hardware interfaces that allow direct control over these things, but I bet for $50 in parts or less, we can just build a bullet proof circuit that will do it.

Depending on what the plasma and hho supplementation gives me, I'm thinking that if I can lean it out by half to about 30:1 at the upper end at max should work - especially if I can ionize some recycled exhaust effectively.

The most mileage on the hwy that I ever got out of this car was 29.5 MPG - I just want to hit 35 MPG hwy as a first goal just to see that I am effectively defeating the built in sabotage - and without any signs of overheating.

I do have a friend about an hour away that has a 5 gas analyzer - would be great to get some emission readings. Unfortunately, I can't do it under load at the emission testing center because they only have the rollers for one set of wheels and this is full time all wheel drive - the only emission test they give for AWD's is a plug in test to read the computer and that is it. So far I don't have a check engine light from any mods so far - good sign!

[Willem Coetzee]

I promised quite some time ago that'll give feedback on the Fiat Uno 1.4 carb + dizzi: Relating to leaning out... my mechanic's exhaust gas analyser reads between 0 & 10 (10=leanest) - he was reducing idle mix from 7 (!) and going below 3, he could not stop shaking his head... (4 according him is a safe lean) Uno just kept its pose, no splatter, no hiccups.

Before hand I asked him to retard timing, but he argued that if I want leaner, he should advance timing. We compromised on 10 BTDC. So down to 2, I was getting seriously worried that the staff dropped the analyser, as Uno gave no hint of trouble idle revs (even heat gauge kept normal). Then on 1 he said "thats it" and made me swear I'm not gona come sue him for burned valves.

And all this was not even with a Murakami Plasma Ignition yet!!! We just did a back-end amp jobby. On the bench we did build a plasma CDI, and then a proof of concept waste spark jobby, but rand out of funds.

But I had to reduce the fuel, cause the Uno evolved instantly into a monster after all carbon was gone from the valves and exhaust - wife's car... so she barely touched the accelerator, and the plasma attempted to change all that fuel into energy... good grief... she became a speed maniac and I started to fear for our lives... imagine the throttle cable got stuck or she hit a sudden bump?!

Any case, also run the new star type of Torque Master spark plugs I imported from USA (Daniel specially made them up non-R for us).

And I had a Stromberg high frequency spark converter (factory is here in RSA, Durban city, KwaZulu-Natal province) which I figure is basically just an air-capacitor/2nd-spark gap in the coil-to-dizzi wire to build up some capacitance before releasing the charge. Closest I could get to HV cap discharge, but the TMs large gap sure enough pulled the HV higher than normal, so I figure there were a bit more mJs, plus about 300-400v cap discharge from the back-end amp.

On level highway at 120kph (max legal in RSA) you almost gave no throttle. And if you pressed the pedal say kwarter in, within no time you had to lift off your foot very fast as it would speed past 160kph without very much effort.

It was at LOW rpm in town driving where ample higher torque was clear to ANYONE that took the Uno to a cafe or so. It didn't had a rev counter, but it sounded like you could change the gears all the way to 5th all at about 1200-1500rpm, no probs - the thing pulled like a bus.

Very odd to me I just could NOT get the mileage better than 18,8 km/L highway, and 15,5 km/L town.

Ironically the weekend before the buyer drove it away (not with the amp included of cause) I discovered that both exhaust boxes where completely buggered - very bad back-compression... and it didn't even made harsh noises, never giving that gremlyn away!

So, I guess, if anybody had any doubts, fear not - Aaron got this stuff cold... and this time around, I'll follow the 3-mods and everything other "common" sense, since our current car is a 2010 Hyundai Atos 1100cc with FI & EI waste spark!!!

Didn't intend no taking over the thread - just want all to watch every detail on Aarons latest vids carefully and pay attention to EVERYTHING before just clamping on stuff... and the BIG thing in Waste Spark Plasma, a-la Murakami method (an evasive feat for many years now) is soon to be PROVEN by Aaron for all contributors and replicators on this thread... and everybody here will witness it 1st-hand

[Aaron Murakami]

wasted spark plasma ignition

I promised quite some time ago that'll give feedback on the Fiat Uno 1.4 carb + dizzi: Relating to leaning out... my mechanic's exhaust gas analyser reads between 0 & 10 (10=leanest) - he was reducing idle mix from 7 (!) and going below 3, he could not stop shaking his head... (4 according him is a safe lean) Uno just kept its pose, no splatter, no hiccups.

Before hand I asked him to retard timing, but he argued that if I want leaner, he should advance timing. We compromised on 10 BTDC. So down to 2, I was getting seriously worried that the staff dropped the analyser, as Uno gave no hint of trouble idle revs (even heat gauge kept normal). Then on 1 he said "thats it" and made me swear I'm not gona come sue him for burned valves.

And all this was not even with a Murakami Plasma Ignition yet!!! We just did a back-end amp jobby. On the bench we did build a plasma CDI, and then a proof of concept waste spark jobby, but rand out of funds.

But I had to reduce the fuel, cause the Uno evolved instantly into a monster after all carbon was gone from the valves and exhaust - wife's car... so she barely touched the accelerator, and the plasma attempted to change all that fuel into energy... good grief... she became a speed maniac and I started to fear for our lives... imagine the throttle cable got stuck or she hit a sudden bump?!

Any case, also run the new star type of Torque Master spark plugs I imported from USA (Daniel specially made them up non-R for us).

And I had a Stromberg high frequency spark converter (factory is here in RSA, Durban city, KwaZulu-Natal province) which I figure is basically just an air-capacitor/2nd-spark gap in the coil-to-dizzi wire to build up some capacitance before releasing the charge. Closest I could get to HV cap discharge, but the TMs large gap sure enough pulled the HV higher than normal, so I figure there were a bit more mJs, plus about 300-400v cap discharge from the back-end amp.

On level highway at 120kph (max legal in RSA) you almost gave no throttle. And if you pressed the pedal say kwarter in, within no time you had to lift off your foot very fast as it would speed past 160kph without very much effort.

It was at LOW rpm in town driving where ample higher torque was clear to ANYONE that took the Uno to a cafe or so. It didn't had a rev counter, but it sounded like you could change the gears all the way to 5th all at about 1200-1500rpm, no probs - the thing pulled like a bus.

Very odd to me I just could NOT get the mileage better than 18,8 km/L highway, and 15,5 km/L town.

Ironically the weekend before the buyer drove it away (not with the amp included of cause) I discovered that both exhaust boxes where completely buggered - very bad back-compression... and it didn't even made harsh noises, never giving that gremlyn away!

So, I guess, if anybody had any doubts, fear not - Aaron got this stuff cold... and this time around, I'll follow the 3-mods and everything other "common" sense, since our current car is a 2010 Hyundai Atos 1100cc with FI & EI waste spark!!!

Didn't intend no taking over the thread - just want all to watch every detail on Aarons latest vids carefully and pay attention to EVERYTHING before just clamping on stuff... and the BIG thing in Waste Spark Plasma, a-la Murakami method (an evasive feat for many years now) is soon to be PROVEN by Aaron for all contributors and replicators on this thread... and everybody here will witness it 1st-hand

Hi Willem,

That's a great breakdown - good story too!

I just did a video of a whiteboard explanation of the wasted spark system. Was going to send it out to everyone that got the Ignition Secrets package.

Before I release it, I want to make sure 100% that the opposite side is getting the plasma for sure. This upside down and backwards ignition system is definitely playing some tricks on me.

The left 2 sides definitely get the plasma - confirmed that over and over.

I did get the plasma on the right but the connections wouldn't hold good so couldn't keep testing at that time and one time was when the cable came off the left side so maybe that forced that hv + to move towards the right to ground.

I have to make certain that I am actually seeing what I'm seeing.

On the left side, the current rush from the cap moves from ground over the gap into the hv +.

On the right side, the current from the cap would have to move through the high resistance of the inductor then into the HV + spark, which is coming from a ground. If the HV + of the spark moves from there, that is no problem, but now I'm not sure that the high speed cap discharge for the plasma will allow that current to move through the high resistance secondary winding!

If it were only as easy as I thought - we'll see.

If not, I have a few solutions, but will explore that if I have to. Fingers crossed!

[Aaron Murakami]

Ok, I just came up with two absolute solutions that will work for wasted spark if my verification of the other plugs firing with plasma are negative.

Problem is, nobody in the world seems to make it so I'll have to do it myself. It's actually fairly simple but I'll get to this if I have to.

[Willem Coetzee]

For a couple of years replicators with waste spark ignition have run into this "prob" of not getting the other side "to plasma" - found it raised (but never answered) in the "old" thread. It didn't bother me cause I wasn't interested in waste spark then.

When we slapped together our testing CDI from a DIY kit, it produced weak plasma with its specked cap, and pushing up the "revs" its charge circuit didn't keep up, and only produced cap discharge.

We made target about 20,000 rpm for plasma production, keeping high-rev motorbikes in mind too (and for FUN too), so the "kit cap" got replaced with one of higher voltage, lower Farrads. And component values had to changed as we kept loosing plasma as the "revs" ceiling raised all the time. Finally we added a secondary "fat-farrad" cap to the primary in got MAD plasma all the way to 20,000 rpm.

After fun and games came the time to get real and plan to install it in something - one available car had wasted spark with FI and the other car a transistor switched carb + dizzi (Uno). Thinking its simpler to do wasted spark plasma, still first working it out on the bench first, we ran into this "plasma on only 2 plugs" thing.

Many configurations and a couple of months later, we opted to run a simpler CDI from wall power through FWBR, and in a specific configuration we GOT the highly desired and sought after Twin Plasma - sort of SAME magnitude plasma in BOTH plugs at the SAME time.

Wanting to apply that config with the CDI bogged down - couldn't get it to work... with hands in hair my friend wanted to completely give plasma up, for his car was the one with the waste spark. We then opted just for a back-end amp that should work on both normal in waste spark as we thought. Worked for me (Uno) as mentioned previously, but the demo one for the waste spark give my friends headaches once more, so he never ran any plasma on his car, and then we ran out of money to do any more research.

(I myself also shelved the topic for a date when I might have money again, but the old bug keeps biting me periodically, and I just can't get rid of the Plasma Fever... LOL)

In my opinion, waste spark plasma is possible, as I evidence it on the test bench, but once more, it will cost Aaron again to point out what we all missing in our attempts to apply it on real life engines...

THANK YOU AARON

[Aaron Murakami]

For a couple of years replicators with waste spark ignition have run into this "prob" of not getting the other side "to plasma" - found it raised (but never answered) in the "old" thread. It didn't bother me cause I wasn't interested in waste spark then.

When we slapped together our testing CDI from a DIY kit, it produced weak plasma with its specked cap, and pushing up the "revs" its charge circuit didn't keep up, and only produced cap discharge.

We made target about 20,000 rpm for plasma production, keeping high-rev motorbikes in mind too (and for FUN too), so the "kit cap" got replaced with one of higher voltage, lower Farrads. And component values had to changed as we kept loosing plasma as the "revs" ceiling raised all the time. Finally we added a secondary "fat-farrad" cap to the primary in got MAD plasma all the way to 20,000 rpm.

After fun and games came the time to get real and plan to install it in something - one available car had wasted spark with FI and the other car a transistor switched carb + dizzi (Uno). Thinking its simpler to do wasted spark plasma, still first working it out on the bench first, we ran into this "plasma on only 2 plugs" thing.

Many configurations and a couple of months later, we opted to run a simpler CDI from wall power through FWBR, and in a specific configuration we GOT the highly desired and sought after Twin Plasma - sort of SAME magnitude plasma in BOTH plugs at the SAME time.

Wanting to apply that config with the CDI bogged down - couldn't get it to work... with hands in hair my friend wanted to completely give plasma up, for his car was the one with the waste spark. We then opted just for a back-end amp that should work on both normal in waste spark as we thought. Worked for me (Uno) as mentioned previously, but the demo one for the waste spark give my friends headaches once more, so he never ran any plasma on his car, and then we ran out of money to do any more research.

(I myself also shelved the topic for a date when I might have money again, but the old bug keeps biting me periodically, and I just can't get rid of the Plasma Fever... LOL)

In my opinion, waste spark plasma is possible, as I evidence it on the test bench, but once more, it will cost Aaron again to point out what we all missing in our attempts to apply it on real life engines...

THANK YOU AARON

I've been out of the loop so long I actually have never seen anyone discuss the wasted spark issue. I know how to make it work - I'll draw it up and PM it to you. I've essentially "reinvented" the wasted spark ignition method with something that makes more sense. There are 2 "easy" ways to do it. I'll look forward to your feedback.

From the first time I ever pulled off my cables from the coil pack on my car, I could see the polarities were backwards. What I mean is that the left 2 terminals were always corroded but the right 2 were always shiny.

The left two output hv+ so the current moves from the ground, over the plugs and towards the coil on that side bombarding the terminals with electrons (if they even exist). So that is the damage to the left terminals. That also means that on the left side, the center electrodes of the plugs will receive the bombardment.

The right two being shiny shows the + voltage potential moves from the ground over the plug towards the coil - therefore, the electron current on that side moves from the coil towards the plug. I didn't look but I bet if I peek into the boots on the right side, the boots might be a little corroded instead of the terminals. That means that on the right side plugs, the center electrodes should be fine, but the ground strap is what will be bombarded.

[Willem Coetzee]

Thanks Aaron! I'm sure all are glued to their projects again...
To get the correct polarity on ignition coils the metal surfaces "tell" you as you said (like nature shows you direction by looking at moss growth, or bark thickness on trees, and so on).
Maybe people know this already but just incase somebody doesn't - If one has some fresh surfaces without these corrosion indicators yet, one can do the following:

WASTE SPARK - Connect one coil terminal HT lead securely to plug base, but don't connect the other terminal of the coil's HT lead onto spark plug head - leave it off with about 5 mm (3/8"?) gap between spark plug head and HT lead connector. Lay the plug and 2 HT leads down on a well insulated dry wooden surface. Now leave the sharp-end point of a graphite pencil in the center of that gap. The pencil point should NOT touch either plug head or HT connector - in other words, no hands near or holding anything. When you now fire the coil, the graphite pencil point makes visible the Spark Travel DIRECTION... the side where the spark COMES FROM is the NEGATIVE terminal of the coil... where the spark JUMPS TO is the POSITIVE terminal of the coil.

See Aaron's post above to understand spark direction. Its THAT simple! (its in the foundation of what Aarons book and video package "Ignition Secrets" teaches)

NORMAL COIL - Connect spark plug base securely to the low- and high voltage common (hope I say this right). Again, don't connect the HT lead connector to spark plug head, and lay plug and lead down as explained above with graphite pencil sharp point in the center of the gap, not touching either sides. Again, when you fire the coil, Spark Travel DIRECTION is made visible - the side where the spark COMES FROM is the NEGATIVE terminal of the coil... where the spark JUMPS TO is the POSITIVE terminal of the coil.

But never just believe me... double check me please... maybe I got it back-ward... so don't plug-in diodes or other components unless 100% sure... if I'm right, I have not lost all my marbles yet!

[1w9m8b9]

Ok, after reading some of the posts in here about waste spark, I'm not sure if I have the best understanding of it. I'm going to write a brief description of my understanding; someone please correct me if I've got anything wrong! Sorry in advance Aaron if this is all stuff you're planning to cover in a future video.

My understanding of waste spark is that the MOST important thing is to be firing a spark into the 'empty' cylinder during the exhaust stroke. I've heard that auto manufacturers first made the wasted spark system for no other reason than to get rid of the extra spark produced by that particular ignition system, but for some reason doing that ended up improving performance.

Why exactly performance is improved by waste spark no one knows, but perhaps there is a little Brown's gas in that cylinder following the power stroke, and hitting it with a spark causes an implosion.

Anyways my main question is this: is it important to have one positive and one negative spark? Does is matter which spark ignites the power stroke stroke and which ignites the exhaust stroke?

My plan for my motorcycle was to just use two CDIs, two coils and two negative sparks, for simplicity's sake. I could potentially just trigger them both at the same time, since I've got a 2-cyl engine. Any thoughts on this approach?

Thanks

[Aaron Murakami]

Ok, after reading some of the posts in here about waste spark, I'm not sure if I have the best understanding of it. I'm going to write a brief description of my understanding; someone please correct me if I've got anything wrong! Sorry in advance Aaron if this is all stuff you're planning to cover in a future video.

My understanding of waste spark is that the MOST important thing is to be firing a spark into the 'empty' cylinder during the exhaust stroke. I've heard that auto manufacturers first made the wasted spark system for no other reason than to get rid of the extra spark produced by that particular ignition system, but for some reason doing that ended up improving performance.

Why exactly performance is improved by waste spark no one knows, but perhaps there is a little Brown's gas in that cylinder following the power stroke, and hitting it with a spark causes an implosion.

Anyways my main question is this: is it important to have one positive and one negative spark? Does is matter which spark ignites the power stroke stroke and which ignites the exhaust stroke?

My plan for my motorcycle was to just use two CDIs, two coils and two negative sparks, for simplicity's sake. I could potentially just trigger them both at the same time, since I've got a 2-cyl engine. Any thoughts on this approach?

Thanks

I'm not sure that the intention was to get rid of the "extra spark" necessarily. It is an intrinsic part of the design for the HV output to fire across 2 gaps and that is about it. By doing that, you are forcing the voltage to get a bit higher to jump to 2 spark plug gaps and that would be better performance, but I don't know how significant that boost is. We an open our plug gaps and do the same thing to increase the voltage the hv goes to in order to jump the gap.

Just looking at the direction that the HV positive goes (forgetting about the direction of current in the opposite direction)... HV + leaves the coil and moves over a gap towards ground on one of the plugs... in order for that HV positive to actually complete circuit to the other end of the HV coil, it must go from ground and towards the center electrode of the opposite plug, which is connected to the other end of the HV coil. So to complete it's loop, it has to jump over 2 gaps and that is about all the wasted spark ignition comes down to.

The timing is set so that when either plug is needed to be fired on the compression cycle, it will fire there igniting the air fuel mixture - and the opposite plug in the opposite piston will also fire, but it just happens that the exhaust port is open and the spark does nothing there - so it is a spark that is essentially, wasted.

One plug has HV + jumping over the gap towards ground. The other end of the coil is NOT firing a HV negative, it is receiving HV + from the ground meaning current is moving from the plug towards ground.

Because of that, it complicates issues for the plasma ignition. Willem has found a way around this in his past experiments - a bit different from how I'm getting around it, but it accomplishes the same thing.

I'm doing some tests and am ordering some custom plug cables, etc... so I can do it right and do some real tests on the road instead of just alligator clipping things. When I can verify that it holds up in a promising way and that it is RIGHT, then I'll be able to share it but I don't want to waste people's time on something that is just a "good idea."

If it pans out, then it will make it possible to put the plasma ignition on millions of cars that otherwise wouldn't be compatible.

[1w9m8b9]

Thanks Aaron, I think I've got it now. Haha you've probably been wondering what the hell I've been talking about then.

So no one has heard of that wasted spark actually doing something useful, besides increasing the voltage of the spark? Not sure if it's legit, but I saw this video of Joe Booker talking about it, but it's hard to say exactly what he meant from the way he was describing it. It seemed like what he was getting at was that the wasted spark is not actually wasted; that there is implosive gas in the gasoline exhaust for a second, right after it burns, and that sparking it can cause an implosion and basically turn your exhaust stroke into a second power stroke.

Seemed like an interesting possibility, so I was going to test it out and see if it actually does increase the power just from sparking the empty cylinder.

[Willem Coetzee]

As Aaron sometimes explain, when the (+) or "sucking / pulling" charge first gets compressed against the diode trying to reach common ground, and being blocked by the diode, it gets all bundled up, and then have to "turn around" and recoil at about 5-10 times faster than the LV cap discharge (cap discharge already being 5-10 times faster than normal induction coil discharge) to the ground of a SINGLE spark plug, is awesome to behold.

So if you have a CDI for each cylinder firing 2 cylinders at the same time for wasted spark engine, using non-R plug wires and non-R spark plugs, you DON'T run into the Biggest Enemy of Plasma... RESISTANCE.

What I mean is that Aaron always advise to use NON-R spark plugs & NON-R plug terminal leads... WHY? Just on CDI alone, R "eats" capacitance, converting electric energy into heating of the coil, leads, plug electrodes, etc... the higher the "R", the worse the resulting spark energy.

The speed of capacitive discharge is pushed up 10 or 20 time using the Murakami-method to get Plasma in the spark gap.

Firing 2 plugs in serie clamped together has MUCH LESS resistance between them than if they where fitted in the head an engine. THINK ABOUT IT...

Take just a CDI and put 2 plugs in serie: you add the gap sized together and gap resistance is 2 x that of 1 gap, so Voltage must go a bit higher to jump higher resistance.

Now put "R" (resistance) between the 2 plugs, every time a higher R, and capacitive discharge over the gaps decrease a bit more every time R is increased. So that will alter potential plasma discharge TOO.

Don't know the math, like decrease by square root of whatever, but earlier in this threat was mentioned "no plasma under X cap uF", so: reducing R = increasing RE, and increasing R = decreasing RE.

Firing each cylinder with each its own Plasma Ignition will give good results if they all produce the same output. But with 4, 6 or 8 cylinders, this option will becomes pricy.

So to economize, you want ONE system to fire the plugs, whether firing 2, 3, or 4 coil packs for wasted spark engines.

In wasted spark inline 4 cylinder engine, plugs 1 & 4 might fire together, and 2 & 3 fire together. Just taking a plain CDI again as example - What is R in the head over the distance between plug 1 & 4 (are further apart from one another in head) than plugs 2 & 3 (are NEXT to one another in head)?

I noticed on the Fiat Uno distributor 4 inline cylinder engine, that the longer the plug terminal wire was, the LESS plasma I got. How did I see?

Well, I was first not using Torque Master spark plugs, just non-R's, and before I have had the carburetor leaned-out. Then when the TMs came I screwed out the normal non-R's, and THAT is how I SAW: Plug-1 (50cm plug wire length) = blackest; Plug 2 (40cm plug wire length) = brown; Plug 3 (30cm plug wire length) = light brown with clearly light grey plasma path; Plug 4 = (20cm plug wire length) completely light grey with CLEAN metal surface along plasma path.

If you guessed that the PLUG WIRES were NOT completely "non-r", you are right. So longer the plug wire, the higher the R, the LESS it had plasma ignition.

How does this apply to wasted spark?

The (+) voltage path from coil (+) terminal, over plug wire, over first spark gap, through metal head, then second spark gap, then over plug wire connected to coil (-) terminal... has a nominal Total R. I guess that plug set 1 & 4 and 2 & 3 might not have the same Total R, nevermind that in each set, the plugs in compression-stroke has different R than plug in exhaust-stroke.

Maybe the portion of (+) that gets transmitted through aether is part of the solution to make 2 plugs in serie with metal of an engine's head between them, both fire plasma. This is uncharted territory - so I can be wrong.

Yet, on the bench with 2 plugs just clamped together, like Aaron mentioned in his last post, one can make them both fire plasma, and so for somebody that missed what he actually is trying to do, it is NOT just to have a demo of 2 clamped plugs both firing plasma, because THAT does NOT teach HOW to OVERCOME the RESISTANCE against Radiant Energy of the metal engine head that sits BETWEEN the two spark plugs!

That might already have been overcome by Aaron, and he might now already be 3 steps further into that dark unknown, but I don;t even now what is in there that need overcoming...

And if anybody got lost about what the goal of all this is - from the view point of a piston in an engine, Aaron will accomplish THIS (not the clamped lab version) in a REAL engine:
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v...type=2&theater

[ThankyouBedini]

Hi!

I just wonder if anybody in this form has any experience with this timing. http://hydrogengarage.com/multi_fuel_timing_plate.html
To me it seems like an easy way to get the ignition parts and the timing parts for a small generator. Just add diodes...

Thank you very much.

[Willem Coetzee]

Hi!

I just wonder if anybody in this form has any experience with this timing. http://hydrogengarage.com/multi_fuel_timing_plate.html
To me it seems like an easy way to get the ignition parts and the timing parts for a small generator. Just add diodes...

Thank you very much.

Is this an MSD part/kit?

[Aaron Murakami]

That looks like a nice kit, but that is very expensive. Here is an excerpt from an online document regarding the wasted spark issue on gas generators:

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It is cheaper for the manufacturer to operate the spark from the output shaft of the engine rather than taking a linkage from the camshaft of a four-stroke engine. This generates a spark for every revolution of the output shaft. But, a four-stroke engine only needs a spark on every second revolution, so the extra spark is not needed and so is called a “waste” spark as it is wasted since there is no gas for it to ignite. This waste spark is harmless when the engine is being run on fossil fuel which needs a spark timing before Top Dead Center.

The waste spark is most definitely not harmless when the timing is altered to some degrees after Top Dead Center as needed by hydroxy gas operation. In this instance, when the waste spark occurs, the intake valve will be open creating a continuous path to the bubbler, and the waste spark will ignite the gas causing the bubbler lid to be blown off disrupting the gas supply to the engine. It is absolutely vital to suppress any waste spark, and that is seldom an easy thing to do.

The spark timing needs to be mechanically linked to the position of the cam shaft, with either a contact on the cam shaft or a valve, or a 2:1 gearing down of the drive shaft as no electronic circuit can distinguish one particular pulse from a long row of identical pulses. [While] It is easy to build an electronic circuit to suppress every second spark, there is no way of knowing which spark to suppress. Pick the wrong spark and you instantly blow the gas supply. All the sparks look the same so you have a 50% chance of picking the wrong spark to suppress, so a contact or sensor on the cam shaft or a valve is essential whether or not an electronic circuit is used. An alternative is to take the timing from an external shaft, geared down to half the speed of the drive shaft as that is essentially a replication of the cam shaft.

So, when considering what generator to buy, you need to check the electrical power output, the noise level, the timing adjustment and if there is a waste spark and how easy it would be to avoid it.

Editor's Note: There have been some, Walter J. (Mick) McNichols for one, who have painstakingly adjusted the mechanical timing to make sure the piston is after TDC (top dead center) and the intake/exhaust valves were still closed. This can successfully eliminating the opportunity of the spark flashing back through the open valve into the hydrogen supply. However it took well over 2 months to do this and it was NOT sucessfull on all motors, especialy the cheap Asian knockoff imports.

It would be much better to obtain an electronic solution to ba able to electronically adjust the timeing to it's optium position as well as being able to avoid the disasorous effects of waste spark flash back. I have been told an electerical genius names Les Banki who works with a South Aferican fellow (Wouter Ostenhousz) has designed just such a device specifically for running a small generator's ICE. Let's hope for true sucess as many of us are desiring to move off the grid. wjm 7/13/08

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On my generator, I don't use HHO right now so I'm not worried about the wasted spark.

However, I built the ignition to be infinitely variable - $125 for MSD, $40 coil, $15 misc.... whole thing is about $180.

To eliminate the wasted spark, I'd make a small circuit that gets triggered from the reed switch and will only trigger the transistor every other trigger. For a little bit of money, I can accomplish for less than $200 what that $1000 kit costs... wow! That's a nice kit but damn that's expensive.

Someone posted a picture of my timing setup from the 2013 conference:

[serendipitor]

Here are some pictures of how I am making the waste spark eliminator on a Yamaha YZ360 generator. My objective was to make a cheap proof of concept before sinking more money into better parts. Gears are expensive! And I am not much of a mechanic, so pardon the crude fabrication to which I am limited. I found these injection molded plastic gears from Quality Transmission Components: http://www.qtcgears.com/RFQ/default....rs/KHK110.html

I used the 40 and 80 tooth pieces, module 0.8. First I pulled the long bolt that fixes the rotory field magnets to the engine, and used JB Weld to attach two gears together, along with some spacers to extend the gears out of the bearing holder. I used two 40 tooth gears to make mating with the 80 tooth gear less critical, and to better withstand the torque on the bolt.

It would be better to use gears with a steel core so that they take that considerable torque to which the long bolt is tightened. It would be even better to make a new bolt that would be longer, with an added section to hold the gear such that the function of the bolt is not compromised. I then made a bracket to hold a pivot for the large gear, such that timing can be adjusted by rotating the pivot. The bracket mounts on the holes that hold the cover plate on.


This gear will have the magnet which will trigger the hall effect device. It's a work in progress. I suspect the gears will last a while, since there is no stress on them. I hope that the rotor won't decide to slip in the generator due to the lessened torque on the bolt. Overall cost is low.

At first I looked at the use of a pulse delay circuit to effect the ignition retardation, as shown in the material from Patrick Kelly, but eventually I thought better of it, as it only will make the proper delay at one value of RPM. That might be OK for a 3600 RPM generator, but getting there is the problem. If we are dealing with high flame speed, then only a mechanically syncronised ignition will give a spark at 0 degrees TDC at any RPM. Backfiring is to be avoided!