4 ms·
How electronic ignition works and also how to make a spark plug play music
- throwway120385 2y agoCoil-on plug was not terribly common in the 90's. More likely you would have had a "distributorless" ignition system with a coil pack mounted somewhere in the engine compartment and plug wires from that to the engine. Earlier in the 90's you would have still had a distributor but with electronic fuel injection either by direct injection or by throttle-body injection. The only TBI engine I've had was an OBD1 system with a distributor attached to the oil pump. It was built in 1995. The only electronic ignition engine I drove from the 90's was from 1996 and it had an OBD2 system with a coil pack. My first coil-on-plug engine was from 2006. Otherwise this is a great article.
- mhandley 2y agoMy son has a Seat Leon MK1 from 2002 and that uses coil-on-plug. The MK1 was released in 1999, so likely at least VW group were using coil-on-plug in the late 1990s.
- nickff 2y agoCOP was invented in the 1930s, and first used on automobiles in the 1970s: https://gtc.ca/blog/the-different-types-of-ignition-systems/#elementor-toc__heading-anchor-4 https://gtc.ca/blog/the-different-types-of-ignition-systems/...
- technothrasher 2y ago> Earlier in the 90's you would have still had a distributor but with electronic fuel injection Even by the mid-80's, many European cars were already running this setup, or at least electronic ignition and CIS injection.
- mikestew 2y agoI was still a professional mechanic in the 90s. Coil-on-plug was becoming common even amongst American brands, let alone European.
- roughly 2y agoBetween the Autopian, Defector, 404Media, and about a dozen other sites, it's fascinating how much good writing, interesting content, and genuinely great internet was apparently being held back by whatever combination of VC, private equity, and just general herb-ish "media executives" over the last decade. It didn't _have_ to be the decade of the listicle, we didn't _have_ to lose the entire media ecosystem, there was still an audience for good content.
- DidYaWipe 2y agoWhat is that supposed to mean? Are you complaining about Autopian's refusal to show you the media for the article unless you accept marketing cookies? Because you should be. Here's the article from the guy who did the work: https://newscrewdriver.com/2024/06/08/toyota-sienna-denso-coil-on-plug-module/ https://newscrewdriver.com/2024/06/08/toyota-sienna-denso-co...
- indianSummer 2y agoLet me add, (from experience) that any way the plug gets lit, whether it be old school distributor, coil pack, or coil on plug, it can shock a human very badly. It's easy to get lulled into a false sense of comfort working on 12v automotive electricals, but the power levels going to the spark plug are much higher.
- technothrasher 2y agoI build and sell reproduction electronic ignition units for old 1980s sports cars, and I've gotten hit with the full secondary voltage on my bench setup a couple times. Even with current limiting and safety cut-outs in place on my bench top power supply, it is very, very unpleasant.
- xeromal 2y agoDon't those coil packs distribute 10-20k volts?
- londons_explore 2y agoI'm kinda sad that as far as I can see, no cars have protections against 'stupid DIY mechanic puts finger in spark plug while cranking engine'. I'm sure those sparks have killed many people by now. All they'd need to do is have the spark happen not to ground but to another return wire, and then check the impedance between both wires and ground is infinite before firing. Plenty of other benefits to such a design - eg. you can more accurately measure flame propogation within the cylinder (detect bad nozzles on injectors).
- MisterTea 2y ago> I'm sure those sparks have killed many people by now. Probably not many. I have been shocked when I was twisting the distributor on my old '95 Tahoe to adjust timing after maintenance. It bit me good but I have felt and survived worse.
- londons_explore 2y agoThose who don't survive don't post on HN
- 082349872349872 2y ago> ...is any of this useful for anything? A musical ignition coil might not be... Some Siemens engineers decided that if they couldn't get rid of locomotive startup leaking into the audio bands, they might as well make it sound like they meant to be playing it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpMxETSV4K8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpMxETSV4K8
- mikestew 2y agoCaptain Pedantic asks, "isn't 'electronic ignition' an ignition system that uses an electronic module instead of physical points?" I've not heard a definition of "electronic ignition" that cares about how the electricity gets to the spark plug. Instead, we are concerned with how we trigger the magnetic field to collapse and makes spark: is it the mechanical opening of a switch, or is it transistors? And using that definition, we've had electronic ignition commonly put in cars since the 70s. Distributor, or lack thereof, has nothing to do with that definition.
- northwest65 2y agoIndeed, I too chuckled at that. Do you remember those hobbyist kits from the 80s for building your own electronic ignition unit? (i.e. points replacement)
- Animats 2y agoThat's called a "singing arc".[1] It's a plasma speaker. Those are good tweeters, but run in air, they generate too much ozone. In helium, though...[2] [1] https://teslascience.wordpress.com/making-a-music-playing-plasma-arc/ https://teslascience.wordpress.com/making-a-music-playing-pl... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeMCBb_Fo78 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeMCBb_Fo78
- smusamashah 2y agoIs the sound coming from arc itself or the metal that its touching?
- Animats 2y agoThe arc itself. The plasma generates the sound. This is a very low inertia speaker. Link [2] shows the commercial version of that speaker, with a large helium tank.
- metadat 2y agoIs the generated ozone undesirable because it's dangerous / unhealthy for humans? P.s. the videos in the first link are wild https://youtube.com/watch?time_continue=144&v=puch1sLN0mg https://youtube.com/watch?time_continue=144&v=puch1sLN0mg
- Animats 2y agoYes.
- trhway 2y ago"listen the station in the arc between antenna and grass." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9UO9tn4MpI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9UO9tn4MpI
- londons_explore 2y agoWhichever engineer designed that spark plug should have tested it better to ensure the spark didn't 'wander' around as it's doing! It's going to be next to impossible to tune an engine properly if the spark location wanders around a few mm for no reason.
- mnemotronic 2y agoI'm thinking 16, as in Volkswagon W16, part harmony on the Queen song.
- simne 2y agoAs I understand matters, first spark make air conductive (could say, it becomes plasma), and than for some time you need much less power to light plasma. Very similar physics behave in classic neon lamps - they use short high voltage impulse to ignite plasma, then much less voltage to support it. So one could make two circuits - one (already existed), will provide enough power to "cold start", other will just provide modulated from waveform voltage (probably, something like pwm). Sure, second circuit should be fast enough to be in time with sound, but again, as I said, need much less voltage. I cannot provide exact numbers now, but as I hear, for spark plug like gap at atmosphere pressure, need few kilovolts to spark plasma, and may be within 1Kv to support plasma. In ICE pressure is much higher, because of this, in electronic ignition usually used up to 100Kv to make spark. If you could make low pressure environment, ~ 1/100 of atmosphere at sea level, you could probably limit to few hundreds volts for all.
- simne 2y agoAlso exists some chemistry, which make air conductive at much less voltage. Also exists tricky schemes, where something very similar to AM radio transmitter, made air closer to ignition, and then need much less voltage to make plasma.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- DidYaWipe 2y agoLink to the original article, so you don't have to agree to the "Autopian"'s douchey "accept marketing cookies or we won't show you the media:" https://newscrewdriver.com/2024/06/08/toyota-sienna-denso-coil-on-plug-module/ https://newscrewdriver.com/2024/06/08/toyota-sienna-denso-co...