EJ22 won't start

[asra]

You are right Mike, the only thing thing keeping Bryce"s RAF upright is pilot skill.

[blakemorem]

Skill is said to be an African Bum disease,;D ;D ;D, I don"t think that will help,I haven"t flown it but it LOOKED alright to me sure not the other big fancy Raffs there but good tradesmen don"t need fancy tools either, Maybe the Statler and Waldorf team have a second opinion, , Any way I don"t have much time, busy on contract up grading mobile networks transmission, capacity expansion for all you phone freaks... I"m looking forward to flying this weekend if the weather hold out. Hope we get back to the ECU next weekend yous can ***** slap me while i"m up there I kinda like the abuse anyway.Mike.

[Brian]

The green RAF actually isnt too bad to fly...apparently, I have it from a good source. Keep that big stab on & all should hopefully be well !Might be worth contacting the former owner, seemed to remember something going wrong, cant remember exactly what but if all else fails ....

[aussie_paul]

The green RAF actually isnt too bad to fly...apparently, I have it from a good source. Keep that big stab on & all should hopefully be well !Might be worth contacting the former owner, seemed to remember something going wrong, cant remember exactly what but if all else fails ....Is it G-600?Aussie Paul.

[asra]

The green RAF actually isnt too bad to fly...apparently, I have it from a good source. Keep that big stab on & all should hopefully be well !Might be worth contacting the former owner, seemed to remember something going wrong, cant remember exactly what but if all else fails ....Trouble is Brian that big stab is only doing something at the higher speed ranges and wouldn"t fully offset the overturning moment of the engine torque X offset.Having said that I flew Paul Campbells RAF hands off, from Caboolture to Watts Bridge airfield one day,30 miles, and only touched the stick in the circuit on arrival.It was fitted with the famous "stabulator" but was in no way "stable".

[Brian]

Is it G-600?Aussie Paul. Not sure Paul, it originally came from WA, I reckon it was a Guy Leyonhelm....[something like that ] who had it built. Bloke up north bought it before trading it on the gyro I have now.With trim

[nietz]

G"day Everyone,Time to get away from the "RAF bashin" and back to the actual subject....but I will take Murray Barker"s comments as a compliment, probably the closest I"m gunna get. After Mike came out and gave me a hand to poke around a couple of weeks ago we came to the conclusion (read: hope) it was the knock sensor but weren"t 100% sure so come Monday morning I rang my local, very helpful, contact at Subaru. He told me exactly what I didn"t want to hear, that it wouldn"t be the knock sensor as the engine should run without one. He also did a resistance check on a brand new one and found my sensor was getting the correct resistance (about 0.5 MOhm) so we were back to square one. The Subaru bloke has been convinced from the start that it seems to be an earth problem so suggested "jumping in" some earths to be sure.I finally got some time today to get back out to the hangar so after noting the little wing still hadn"t moved and is starting to get flat spots on the tyres, I got stuck in. The plan was to try to replicate what Mike and I had done a couple of weeks ago to get it going but it was to no avail. Next step was jumping an earth directly from the battery to the ecu as it has been a point of concern and more importantly, an easy option. No joy. The Subaru guys suggestion of jumping a new Earth from the battery to the block was a little more difficult as I didn"t have wire of a thick enough gauge. Now at the "I"ll give anything a go" stage I decided to run the existing earth to a different earth point on the block. It is worth noting at this stage that at two separate occasions I have removed the main earth bolt from the block and cleaned it to ensure a good connection as well as numerous continuity checks. This time I moved the main earth cable that runs from the negative terminal on the battery to a point at the front of the engine which it shares with the alternator and a couple of sensors to a point at the back which it shares with the starter relay and what looks like a few ecu earths. With everything crossable crossed and praying to any gods that would listen, I turned the key.....and away she went, purring like a kitten. Not wanting to turn it off due to the very real chance of it never starting again and not convinced I had actually fixed the problem, I went around and wobbled, poked and prodded every connection trying to make it fail. But it was solid so I was left with no other option but to turn it off and see if it would start again, which it did, time and time again. At this point I was an emotional wreck. I was in disbelief, excited, surprised, saddened, relieved and at one point I had a strange feeling in my pants, you little beauty!I still have some work to do to get it air worthy, including Mike fabricating me a longer earth cable but I believe I have found the fault and the EJ22 is back in action.I would like to thank everybody that has provided suggestions either on this forum, in person, by phone or email as well as a couple of special mentions. Mike (which I notice a lot of you call Blake coz his name on here is blakemorem) who not only took a day out of his very busy schedule to load up his tools and come out and give me a hand but also for getting off this forum for long enough to provide me the inspiration to keep going when I thought all was lost. Also, Phil (aka Philthy) up at Wondai (you may have met him at the Nationals, he also took most of the photos in the last gyro news) who very graciously allowed me to shoot up there when ever I had the urge to get airborne to fly his RAF.Finally, I would like to acknowledge all those people who said "it will just be something simple" so there is no need to post it here.Bryce

[MadMuz]

Great news Bryce.... congrats....see, I told you it would be something simple.... no need to post it here

[Brian]

Thats fantastic news Bryce, well done !!!I"m interested why the new location of the earth strap on the engine made the diference

[blakemorem]

Good work Bryce, seems you can turn sh!t into gold, and you are now the "ECU GURU" I got your text and will make a 25 sq mill silver plate lugged cable with glue base heat shrink,if any others look sus just text me I can makem up while i"m at it. I have an old tube of copper base grease to stop any corrosion at contact points and i"ll give ya a pot of battery terminal goop as i have a box full of em. Looking at in 20x20 hind sight it looks like 1. possibly the starter motor was sucking all the power with a crap earth and resulting in weak spark. 2. that back EMF at exciter could also be caused by crap earth point. I wonder what condition the earth is at terminals especially at battery earth connection. Any way you have nailed it, it"s interesting by locating the earth nearer to the collective earths and i guess the small difference in resistance under heavy start current made all the difference to the coils energy. It shows it ain"t an exact science but good knowledge for the next poor ******* with an ECU fault. Bryce ECU repairs...sounds good mate you"ll have em lined up at the door. Mike.

[MadMuz]

Well Chopper, my guess would be that if the earth cable from the battery goes to a bolt that shares a gasketed part, like one of the water pump bolts. bolt for thermostat hat or something like that, and sealant is used on the thread.... the pump is possibly insulated from the block by the gasket, the bolt might not have good contact from the sealant.... the motor is possibly insulated by rubber mounts and thread lock compound so even if the cable makes contact thru the pump bolt, the engine might not really be earthed to the frame either. That is why it is good to have an earth cable between mast and keel, keel to engine block.... so all sensors get a good earth.... and earth the computer direct to the battery. That"s why cars have a big earth cable to the block, but there will be a strap from the block or gearbox to the chassis, and often many of the computer earths go to the negative terminal buddy style with the main earth.... things like ABS and airbag controllers that definitely mustn"t fail due to a marginal earth contact.I"m glad he sorted the problem tho, and lucky it was something relatively small and he never bought another computer or something else expensive which wasn"t the problem..... good work

[blakemorem]

A long time ago when i was a young fella i tried to start the farm ute, it was an old Holden Belmont 161 red engine. all i got was a click sound and some smoke came out from under the bonnet and the accelerator pedal dropped to the floor. yep a bad earth to the engine block and it found earth thru the accelerator spring. Faults are simple when you find them it"s the looking bit that makes work.Mike.

[MadMuz]

A long time ago when i was a young fella i tried to start the farm ute, it was an old Holden Belmont 161 red engine. all i got was a click sound and some smoke came out from under the bonnet and the accelerator pedal dropped to the floor. yep a bad earth to the engine block and it found earth thru the accelerator spring. Faults are simple when you find them it"s the looking bit that makes work.Mike.Yeah, similar to fitting stereo or cb radios in cars, if you screw the earth wire to part of the dash that isn"t connected properly to the frame... the radio earths thru the aerial.... creates all sorts of problems.I guess the best thing this thread has done is get people to think about making sure earth wire connections are true and correct, so thanks Bryce

[Disco]

Good on ya Bryce.

[mad max]

If in doubt, fit another earth. That"s my rule. Many a motor vehicle has come to me with weird problems and I used to first ask "Has the engine or G/Box been recently removed" If the answer is "Yes" then I"d dive straight under and check the motor/body/chassis earths. Mechanics often forget to bolt it back to the G/box. I even earth my coolant pipes on my new Gyro but that"s to try and eliminate interference on my HF transceiver. And maybe it helps slow down electrolysis eating my alloy pipes. (The HF is to file sit-reps and pos-reps to the "General" back home) Can"t afford a Sat. Phone.