Thursday, May 10, 2018

A Spark Generating Apparatus


I'm working on developing an Arduino-based small engine tachometer that takes its input signal from an engine's spark plug wire. Going outside to experiment with a live engine got tiresome, so I arranged this on my wood lathe.






It's a scrapped Tecumseh TVS90 lawnmower engine with the fuel tank, air cleaner and carburetor removed.

It works. I run it at the lathe's lowest speed (500 rpm) and I get spark generation for testing my tachometer design. A downside is that crankcase oil seeps down past the piston eventually and comes out the open spark plug hole in the cylinder head. I'm also getting what I take to be electromagnetic field generation from the ignition coil that's overwhelming my pickup probe. I haven't had that problem with a live engine mounted on a lawnmower.

So, it remains to be seen whether or not I can call this item a success.

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Addendum -- SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2019

Here's a brief video of the rig in action.



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