Originally Posted by antique

My 100 year old Model T, 1912, runs just fine..No starter, no generator, no turn signals, no battery, no heater..20 MPG, 35 mph..Just right for an "antique"
I defy anyone to tell the difference in engine performance between 4.8 and 7.4 volts...Our gasoline fueled Aerrow 200 ignition twin went 225 mph in a Lancair at Galveston a few years ago...4.8 volts, mine or C&H ignition....

Just think if you run a 12 volt battery she'll hit the sound barrier

all the smart remarks about higher voltages its fact, it is better - even BCCHI admitted it the other day..... is it going to make your engine run faster - !

theres a heck of a lot more to it than just the max voltage you can possibly run, but then all you smart guys already know this

Originally Posted by CatalinaWOW

I think antique was adding the years of all the people who gave you the same advice. You had a lot of smart people telling you there was a typo in the manual.

Its not a typo... my understanding they are doing that, to lessen the warranty claims... I dunno, as I am no expert.

I would however take the advice of those given and set it at 28*

I just learned something about the metal spark plug boot used on Zenoha. When you smack the engine on the ground and bust the spark plug off on an inverted engine. You need to replace the boot assy abt $24. The spark will ground out
to the metal shield because the silicon boot inside has puka in it. I figured that out after putting a complete ignition system from another engine that had a busted a spark plug also and it still wouldn't run.

Originally Posted by CatalinaWOW

I think antique was adding the years of all the people who gave you the same advice. You had a lot of smart people telling you there was a typo in the manual.

If Ralf did that, it should be 200+ years, maybe even more.

PS Pueo,

Good point, thanks for posting

My zdz 160 's ignition fails after around twenty flights.The agent replace a new one for me and after thirty or more flights it fails to spark again.Now I fix a RCEXL ignition on it and it works fine for almost two years .I fly almost every Sunday and we don't have winter over here.I have a 150 3w that already have burned out two ignitions. I burn my pocket to buy the 3W ignition.Thanks RCEXL supply us cheaper ignitions so not very well off people me can enjoy the hobby.

Originally Posted by jb0005

i am having a very similar problem to the one stated above. i have changed plugs and it persists. i have swapped the plug caps to see if it would do the same on the other cylinder with no effect(it is always the left cylinder that stops firing).once the engine is warmed up and is firing on both cylinders it will continue to do so until i bring it back to idle, then when i throttle up for a touch and go it will sometimes miss again on one cylinder or in some cases even die completely.the mixture settings appear to be spot on, good transition and nice tan coloured plugs when i check them. could this be a timing issue,a hall sensor issue or ignition issue?it is an rexcel ignition on a crrc pro 55cc twin..any advice or help would be appreciated

i spoke to a friend the other day about the above problem and he suggested trying a 6v battery instead of the 4.8v i had been using. i was reluctant as i have always stuck to the rule of no more than 6v and when fully charged the 4.8v battery is just under that. however i had nothing to lose with everyone else saying that the only answer was a new ignition anyway!. well.. it ran perfectly. the 6v battery had 6.45v charge when i checked it and the engine ran stonger than it has ever run and never missed a beat. i even tried plugging the 4.8v back in once the engine was up to operating temp just to check the difference between the two batteries back to back, and sure enough the engine started missing on the left cylinder again. the same friend also told me that he runs 6v life batteries on all his rexcel ignitions and has never had a problem. so to the guys who have replaced their ignitions with a similar problem, why not try the old iginiton with a higher voltage battery, there is nothing to lose.

Did you check your voltage under load (in operation?) Maybe all you needed was a new 4.8 volt battery.

no i did'nt, but the battery charges up to a peak of about 6.05v versus about 5.9 volts for the 4.8v battery i have in another aircraft. and the battery in question is virtually new. i flew it with the 6v battery today and it ran perfectly and started much easier. i'm going to keep running with the 6v and i'll post if i have any issues

Here are a couple of pictures of the guts of an RCEXL ignition. Yes, this had been filed with an epoxy potting compound, which has been removed. The timing board is the small PCB with the 8 pin microprocessor that is attached on the bottom of the main PCB. The dual output modules are identical, with the exception of having another coil attached.

The wire to the plug would be soldered to the secondary winding of the coil with the + side on the short wire and the ground connection solder to the long wire that connects to the PCB separating the circuitry from the coil.

The failure that I have now seen on four of these ignitions (three single output and one dual) was that the braided ground wire was very close to the anode (+) side and the spark was arcing a path (only about .10" distance) between the silicone insulation and the epoxy potting compound, creating a carbon track. Personally, I would consider this to be a design flaw that was done that way for ease of manufacturing. This failure manifests itself as missing, or just plain failure to fire at the plug. One solution would be to route the wire out the side, leaving the maximum distance between the anode and ground connections. This would be easy on a single output ignition, but a dual output would probably need to have both leads run out the same side. This would not be a simple DIY fix. Do note that the C&H ignitions, which have pretty much the same circuitry and components does not have this issue due to the way they attach the plug wire.

Get a new one and take it apart, that one is old news....New ones have a 16 bit processor and look to be a clone of another of the best ignitions, the C&H Syncrofirel by Ed Vollmer....Think so Chief ?
C&H have the same circuitry because Xu Liang cloned Bill and Ed's ignition...Never quite got it right, but close...

Originally Posted by antique

Get a new one and take it apart, that one is old news....New ones have a 16 bit processor and look to be a clone of another of the best ignitions, the C&H Syncrofirel by Ed Vollmer....Think so Chief ?
C&H have the same circuitry because Xu Liang cloned Bill and Ed's ignition...Never quite got it right, but close...

If I find a new one that has a problem, I'll take it apart, but I'd rather fly than take apart good ones. I'm going to put this one back together, change the way the plug wire is routed, and use it. I do have one that works but reboots RCEXL tachs continuously and seems to be conducting a bunch of noise. Maybe I should pull that one apart...

Do you mean 16 bit or 16 pin? I don't see a reason to use a 16 bit processor, other than that they don't cost much/any more these days. The processor really doesn't have much to do on these ignitions.

Steve

Don't know about electronics...I was told by Bill himelf, he for sure knows...Thought he said 16 bit....

Originally Posted by antique

Don't know about electronics...I was told by Bill himelf, he for sure knows...Thought he said 16 bit....

Well, IMO, the processor doesn't make much difference. (That part is only about .75/each - I still have a reel of them for a product that I had built with them years ago.) They worked fine with the what they were using. The problem, IMO again, is the way the plug wire is routed and attached inside. Changing that will make them much more durable and reliable.

Originally Posted by antique

Don't know about electronics...I was told by Bill himelf, he for sure knows...Thought he said 16 bit....

If I said 16 bit I ment pic 16.Big Difference.
Chinese New Year at this time can not get any word from China. I am sorry I never Did cal Extreme.
Had to go to Billings MT for some check ups.
BC