Computer-Controlled Electronic Ignition
This project typifies the Random Exploits experience. It all started when I was rebuilding my old Yamaha R5. It needed ignition points (remember those?). I checked the parts places for an ignition rebuild kit and discovered to my horror that they were going to set me back $50. Unbelievable. And that got me thinking: how come I don't just make an electronic ignition for the thing? No more points, no adjustments, no timing lights. Sounds perfect, and I save $50.
Never mind the thousand hours of software development and hundreds of dollars to spend on circuit boards and processor development kits, and the near-certainty that it will never actually make it onto the motorbike. It's a project, and sometimes the process is the project, not the end result. Or so I tell my self, usually towards the end of the line.
This project got completed, but never put on the R5. While I was making it, the inside of the gas tank was turning itself into a rusty mess. By the time I was ready to start the mechanical aspects, the tank was becoming the gating item, so the whole thing came to a stop.
After sitting for maybe a year, I had the bright idea that I should adapt it to my Ducati Monster M900. I rewrote the software so that it would model the stock Ducati spark advance curve, and built a test jig to make sure it all worked. The sticking point on that project was that I never did figure out a way to massage the signal coming out of the Ducati crankshaft position sensor to be suitable as an input for this board. The final word on that project was when I sold the Monster.
But who knows: I still have the R5, and probably always will, if only because it is worthless to anyone except to me. Some day, I'll get the tank cleaned and do a bit of machining, and be back in business.
Project Details:
It will be worth it in the end.
Wright Cyclone in full song.