----- Original Message -----

From: David Leonard

To: Rotary motors in aircraft

Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 3:03 AM

Subject: [FlyRotary] Safety: LED on EC2 and Power from injectors

Thanks, Tracy, that’s a big relief.  However, today I was thinking about that.  It means that if you have your injectors and coils on the main bus like I do, then the “magnetos” are hot whenever the main bus is turned on.  This could in theory lead to the engine firing if the prop is turned a little with the main buss on – like pushing the plane around at night with the lights on etccc…  Something to be careful of – although I really like the additional source of potential power.

 

David Leonard

The Rotary Roster:

http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/rotaryroster/index.html

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Rotary motors in aircraft [mailto:flyrotary@lancaironline.net] On Behalf Of Tracy Crook
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2003 8:06 PM
To: Rotary motors in aircraft
Subject: [FlyRotary] Re: LED on EC2 and Power from injectors

 

This is all normal David.  The EC2 getting power through the injectors is a side effect of the voltage spike protection circuitry inside the EC2.

 

  As an interesting aside,  Mark Kirkpatrick called yesterday to report that he had an in-flight failure of some sort.  The engine quit and he switched to B controller.  The engine ran but mixture was lean so he corrected with the mixture control and landed at his intended airport which was close by.   While taxiing to the hangar he noticed that the circuit breaker to the EC2 was in the off position.  The only reason the EC2 continued to function was the power feed back through the injectors.  You can imagine how dirty the power was since the EC2 was constantly switching the injectors on & off.   Mark also switched back to A controller and it ran OK.

 

This was not an intended fail-safe feature of the EC2 but it might have saved Mark and his plane on this occasion.  No word yet on why the breaker blew.  It was either a 2 or 10 amp breaker.  The EC2 uses less than .25 amp.  

 

This is another illustration of why you need to have a *well rehearsed* emergency checklist.

 

Tracy Crook

----- Original Message -----

From: David Leonard

To: Rotary motors in aircraft

Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2003 10:40 AM

Subject: [FlyRotary] LED on EC2 and Power from injectors

 

When I power up my EC2 the program select button glows red.  I am hoping that this is normal – although green would have been a more re-assuring color.  The interesting thing is that when I supply power to the main buss (but not the EC2) the LED also glows red.  Is this normal?  The juice is getting to the EC2 via the injectors (which are powered by the main buss).  If I unplug the injectors the LED goes out.  Seems strange, but I’m hoping everything is OK and hope I don’t have to start re-wiring.

 

David Leonard

The Rotary Roster:

http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/rotaryroster/index.html