20V: Distributorless 20v setup

[mr220v]

This has been rumored to work, but I wanted to see for myself.

So I finally got the coils I wanted to use for this test. A set of 01 civic coils.

I made up a little harness with the coil plugs. Tied in the 12v and ground to each of the plugs, and tied all the coil signal wires together and hooked them up to my IGT igniter output.

It worked!!!! I was able to run distributorless without a special module. Somehow, firing all 4 coils at once does not ignite the intake charge at the bottom of the intake stroke.

I had tested this same concept out with a set of camry coils. These were the non-igniter type, basically a coil on plug controlled by a seperate igniter. Using these, I backfired out the intake every time. The car wouldn't run. I'm guessing the honda coils are more precise and have a shorter duration spark which misses setting off the intake charge. That or the spark is only strong enough to set off a compressed A/F mixture?

This is an awesome discovery, though not one I originally made. For some reason, it's been around, just nobody has really brought it up amazingly.

So, aside from the potential intake backfire, I can't find any other downside to this. Like I said, most likely I will be integrating this feature into my harness for a small additional cost. So when you buy my harness, you can avoid bashing firewalls or spending money on dizzy relocation kits.

The thing is...this would probably work on other toyotas.

[wagonis]

NICE!

[Kerry Phillips]

Do U have a wiring diagram for that innovation?

May I toss in some ideas/miscellenous ramblings?

Maybe with just a little electronics, only two coils would be needed. My understanding that most GM use 1 coil per pair of cylinders and simply have a "waste spark" Might just be more practical to have 4 coils then fabricate HV plug connections....

Again, by using a little electronics, one can turn off half the coils and eliminate the early ignition problem.

In Conclusion (applause here please) I was planning on utilizing an Accel High performance coil, read some claims of a 2mpg improvement?

Hmmm No dizzy cap or rotor to buy? Then just maybe we can splice/engineer some cheap off the shelf plug wires from the sparkplug "Towers" to the coils. Eliminate the $100 silvertop plugwire set! This mod/improvement might pay for itself.
Kerry

[mr220v]

I wouldn't call it a "problem", at least not to normal driving and operation. The problem will only occur if for whatever reason you've been repeatedly cranking the engine and building up unburned fuel in the cylinder. When it finally goes to crank, it will ignite the unburned mixture resulting in a backfire that otherwise wouldn't occur with an ignition system firing plugs individually.

That's the whole point of this. I'm running distributorless without any crazy cylinder identification electronics, or additional cam or crank pickups. I'm firing all the honda coils at once, and it's working. I saw somebody had done this on club4ag and wanted to try it for myself. I wouldn't have otherwise tried it as I would have thought ignition at the bottom of the intake stroke would surely occur. This happens to not be the case.


This setup also eliminates the need for wires. These particular honda coils are a dime a dozen. You can get a set for $25 sometimes.

[te51levin]

Subscribing. I am running a waste spark setup but not on stock electronics. I'm too dopey right now to work through the mechanics of firing each coil on each spark event, but...well...I'll follow along and see what develops.

Kerry, you won't get a mileage improvement from an Accel coil unless you're replacing a very weak coil with one that simply works like it should.

[Mista 2]

damn that sounds nice. is it possible for you to post a step by step? i would love to do it.

[mr220v]

Well, it's just 12v to the 12v pins on the honda coils, ground to the ground pins on the honda coils, and then all 4 signal wires tied together and onto the igt wire to the 20v igniter.

It's so simple it's retarded.

[Kerry Phillips]

Mr.220v

I been looking on ebay for Honda coils. What year(s) should we be looking for? Do these "coil on plugs" fit into the ST sparkplug well?

Thanks for this AWESOME discovery. In the future I might try building/designing a simple circuit to alternate activating the coils.
Kerry

[mr220v]

There are many kits on the market for doing just that. Most of them are pretty expensive. There are also various other attempts made by people on club4ag.

That's the crazy thing. All those attempts, and this just seems to work. Super simple.

[Conceptz-X]

You know your firing the coil at 4 times its intended usage, You risk overheating them, not to mention the spark energy will fall off at high RPM. It may work, but for how long?

[mr220v]

The guy who originally did this has been running the setup for over a year.

I'm quite certain you won't get 100k miles out of a set of coils. However, at $30 for a used set, if you were only to get 30k, you can just go buy another set.

You can actually get a set of these coils for cheaper than a 20v distributor cap and rotor.

Also, the main use for this setup is on rwd ae86's where currently you have to either cut a hole in the firewall to clear the distributor, or buy an $700 distributor relocation kit. You can buy an awful lot of honda coils for $700.

In my tests with this setup, the coils did not put off much if any heat.

[Conceptz-X]

The heat is internal, you won't be able to feel it. As far as reliability, I'd keep some spares around, Honda overengineers alot of things, and thats likely why it is working so well. Your engine is stock right? Do you get any high RPM misfire?

[mr220v]

Nope, no misfire.

I'm with you though, I was skeptical at first....though not for the same reasons.

My reason was that I was unsure whether you would get pre-ignition of the intake stroke. Evidently though, when the intake charge is drawn, because it's sequential injection, there is no fuel present when the spark occurs. If you tried this with a 4age 16v, or other batchfired engine, you would most likely light the intake charge somewhere around the bottom of the intake stroke.

Anyway, I tried it out to see what the issues would be, and I couldn't find any short term problem with doing it.

I dont' know if the honda coils are that big of an issue. I know the stock 20v coil is also used with 4runner v6's....no v8's that I know of though, so in this case on a v6, at any given rpm, the coil is working harder.

[Kerry Phillips]

True, on the same RPM the coil works harder on a V6 then a 4pot.

But......

On a ford ranger (LOL) the four cylinder turns 3k @ 60 MPH
the 6 cylinder turns 2k @ 60 MH

4X3k=12k RPM/Cylinders @60 MPH
6X2k=12k RPM/Cylinders

So due to the lower RPM of the larger engine, seems like the coil is working equally hard......

U just got to love theory!~

[Spinnetti]

I always wondered about that too... thing is, the all fire at each tdc is just asking for trouble. Maybe not in "normal" use, but it does heat up the coils I imagine, and if it does happen to ignite, holy cow... BOOM.. using two coils with wasted spark doesn't have that problem as the "waste" spark happens at TDC on the exhaust stroke.

How does that work anyway? Still use the Dizzy for the fuel injector pulse and to trigger the coil packs or ?

[mr220v]

Basically fire all 4 coils at once, just off the igt output from the ecu.

I'm sure there are a number of reasons you don't see this in vehicles from the factory.....but in my tests, I couldn't find any problem with it.

One other thought, spark duration with these coils seems to be shorter than with the 20v coil (one reason the spark and injection don't overlap). With the shorter duration, the coils won't be working as hard.

[Lil Blue Bastard]

Subscribed

[monopolizedinc]

Originally Posted by Lil Blue Bastard

Subscribed

same

[jimmer411]

How do you set base timing with this setup? Are you essentially running 0* base timing since the dizzy is ingnored?

[mr220v]

The dizzy is not ignored. You still have the cam sensor in place which allows you to move the home signals a few degrees relative to the motor. You can still make timing changes.