GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

If it's broken or just needs tweaked

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Pinhead
Posts: 611
Joined: Thu Jan 04, 2007 2:26 am

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby Pinhead » Tue Feb 19, 2013 4:18 pm

frankinbobber wrote:The ignition. I thought that's what this post was about. My bad if i'm wrong


You're correct. I just didn't want to give you the wrong information.

If all else fails, trace the wires to their source.

Yellow and Yellow/White go to the reluctor for cylinders 2/3
Blue and Blue/White go to the reluctor for cylinders 1/4

If you're missing the white tubing (which determines the reluctor polarity) I'm not sure how to determine which is which, other than diving the bike and seeing which way runs better.

Unless you have an oscilloscope and can take a look with the engine turning...

frankinbobber
Posts: 23
Joined: Mon Feb 11, 2013 9:13 pm
Location: Florida

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby frankinbobber » Tue Feb 19, 2013 8:26 pm

IT WORKS! I HAVE SPARK AGAIN1111

Loudhvx
Posts: 37
Joined: Tue Aug 23, 2011 5:51 pm

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby Loudhvx » Wed Feb 20, 2013 5:20 pm

Pinhead wrote:
Yellow and Yellow/White go to the reluctor for cylinders 2/3
Blue and Blue/White go to the reluctor for cylinders 1/4

If you're missing the white tubing (which determines the reluctor polarity) I'm not sure how to determine which is which, other than diving the bike and seeing which way runs better.

Unless you have an oscilloscope and can take a look with the engine turning...


This link explains how to determine the positive and negative wires of a reluctor pickup. (We are arbitrarily selecting a particular polarity direction, but as long as we stay consistent in the convention, the ignition will work as expected.)

The link also explains a little about the magnetic polarity, which is equally important, especially if, as in the case of the KZ's, the magnet polarity can be reversed.

The positive wire is the wire that has a positive voltage as the screwdriver approaches the center pole of the pickup. as the screwdriver moves away, the voltage will be negative.

The other wire is then what we consider the negative wire.

http://home.comcast.net/~loudgpz/GPZweb ... Rotor.html

SchoolDaGeek
Posts: 147
Joined: Fri Aug 26, 2011 8:36 pm

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby SchoolDaGeek » Wed Feb 27, 2013 11:44 am

You know? I had not considered this part of the equation. I will have to go back and look at my original schematic and check it against the bike and this new (to me) information. It very well could be that even though I have the white tubes to identify the rotor wires, they could have been placed on incorrectly and would not mean that both white tubes are the + pickup or the - pickup, but one is - and one is +. I will have to trace the wires. If this pans out, it means the whole time my setup was not working would be because the signals were cancelling each other out, or making the signal too weak.
Buy New, Wire Right. BNWR. LOL

SchoolDaGeek
Posts: 147
Joined: Fri Aug 26, 2011 8:36 pm

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby SchoolDaGeek » Wed Feb 27, 2013 1:06 pm

Well it looks like prices have come down about $7.

If anyone is considering this mod and have been tossing up purchasing used MC Junkyard modules as an option vs. doing all the wiring on the GM modules and coils, I would now recommend price-wise to just go with the new Procom Electrosport modules.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Honda-CB650-CB7 ... f0&vxp=mtr
Buy New, Wire Right. BNWR. LOL

SchoolDaGeek
Posts: 147
Joined: Fri Aug 26, 2011 8:36 pm

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby SchoolDaGeek » Sun Mar 10, 2013 1:40 am

Buy New, Wire Right. BNWR. LOL

frankinbobber
Posts: 23
Joined: Mon Feb 11, 2013 9:13 pm
Location: Florida

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby frankinbobber » Mon Mar 25, 2013 3:17 pm

The Frankinbobber is running great on this ignition i used a different coil mine is an accel for a Mitsubishi.wish i could post picks and videos on here but if you go to my show off thread their is a link to my Facebook pictures

canuck1sailor
Posts: 24
Joined: Sun Jul 01, 2012 2:41 pm
Location: Victoria, Canada

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby canuck1sailor » Tue Apr 23, 2013 1:48 pm

Has anyone else had experience with these ignitors? I would be interested to know if they reduce the amount of warm up time needed. On a cold day I need ten minutes, minimum; not that I am in a hurry to run off on a cold engine mind you. I have also found my bike is a lot happier now that I use a battery maintainer, perhaps the battery is just getting old and tired although a load test indicated it's fine.



The link doesn't seem to want to work, it's three posts above anyway.


Thanks
Ed

MHolmes
Posts: 33
Joined: Mon Sep 24, 2012 9:51 am

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby MHolmes » Thu Apr 25, 2013 6:41 pm

Ok, So i built a sweet little box to hold the hei mod's and mounted the gm coils.

Im getting spark, but i'am only getting spark after releasing the starter button. Have you guys experienced this?

Also I'm taking 12v into one side of each coil from the ignition switch, the other side is my 2 pickup wires (BLU + YEL). Does it matter which side these plug into? Also does the plug orientation matter in relation to this?

I'm going over the wiring now as I had to make my own harness (cb650 in cb500 frame). I can take pictures if needed.

frankinbobber
Posts: 23
Joined: Mon Feb 11, 2013 9:13 pm
Location: Florida

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby frankinbobber » Fri Apr 26, 2013 4:52 am

Are you sure the diodes & resistor are in the right direction?

MHolmes
Posts: 33
Joined: Mon Sep 24, 2012 9:51 am

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby MHolmes » Sat Apr 27, 2013 2:02 pm

from my understanding resistors are bi directional, but the diodes are facing the correct direction.

Image

Image

Loudhvx
Posts: 37
Joined: Tue Aug 23, 2011 5:51 pm

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby Loudhvx » Sun Apr 28, 2013 12:04 pm

Can you verify the color-wire useage.

It looks like:
Red is 12v from starter button.
White is 12v from the ignition switch.
Green is ground.
Copper Braid is ground going to the board, for the LED and pickups.
Are the twoheavy black wires to the negative side of the pickups?
Skiny black is for the LED ground.
Skinny red is for the LED power (i assume it's a 12v LED).
One blue is from the 1-4 pickup.
The other blue is to the 1-4 coil.
One yellow is from the 2-3 pickup.
The other yellow is to the 2-3 coil.

What is the resistance of each pickup?
What resistance R1 and R2 did you use?

The symptom you describe, "sparks only after letting off of the start button" could indicate the resistor values are too low, or the pickups are not grounded. That's what would be most likely, but it can be other things too.

From what I recall, the GM coils didn't have a polarity marking on them. Normally a coil does not have a polarity, but some are still marked with a + and -.

Very sweet looking enclosure.

Loudhvx
Posts: 37
Joined: Tue Aug 23, 2011 5:51 pm

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby Loudhvx » Sun Apr 28, 2013 12:13 pm

MHolmes wrote:Also I'm taking 12v into one side of each coil from the ignition switch, the other side is my 2 pickup wires (BLU + YEL). Does it matter which side these plug into? Also does the plug orientation matter in relation to this?


I assume you did not mean that you hooked up the pickup wires directly to the coils. That would be bad.

I'm not sure what you mean by plug orientation.

MHolmes
Posts: 33
Joined: Mon Sep 24, 2012 9:51 am

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby MHolmes » Mon Apr 29, 2013 7:42 am

Wow pretty good deductive skills, that is is my wiring.

I'll have to get the exact resistance of the pickups tonight. I believe they are 1/2 watt resistors (i'll verify). I know after the diodes i'm getting 539 ohms.

Additional info:

I hooked up the old coils and i get the same result
From G on the HEI mod. i'am only getting 9.9V, should this be 12v?
I dunno if it just the switch being weird and making a bad connection but partially depressed it shoots lots of spark until i let go or its fully depressed and makes a single spark after release

I assume you did not mean that you hooked up the pickup wires directly to the coils. That would be bad.

I'm not sure what you mean by plug orientation.


No, I'am using (BLU/YEL) after the come off the hei mod. C. One goes to one side of one coild and one to the other. Then I have 12v from the ignition for the other side of the coil.

What I meant by plug orientation was more related to firing order. But I should be able to figure that out after i get the spark firing correctly.

Also thanks, I ordered a cheap electronics enclosure off amazon and decided to put a switch in as an anti-theft deterrent (was thinking about a keyless ign. or maybe using a proximity key or something) for now its a key switch.

Loudhvx
Posts: 37
Joined: Tue Aug 23, 2011 5:51 pm

Re: GM HEI: Cheap and Extremely Effective Ignition Upgrade

Postby Loudhvx » Mon Apr 29, 2013 1:01 pm

With ignition on, and the starter button NOT pushed, you should only have close to 0 volts on the G terminal. If there is 9+ volts, then there is voltage getting into the pickup wiring from somewhere.

With the ignition on, and the starter button pushed, the voltage on G should be about 1 to 2 volts.
If there is 9+ volts, then it's possible the pickups are not properly grounded.

The resistors should be around 3900 ohms each. The pickups should measure around 530 ohms each (when at least one end is disconnected).


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