BBR's 83GT - 552 BBF version 3.0 (at least)

[BBR]

Thanks Randal! I was just about to post that I thought the dwell was probably on the high side and it was the primary reason I posted those pics.

[TheSilverBuick]

Considering you got those coils from Bill, they are probably powerful enough to take a bunch of dwell and eat your spark plugs

[BBR]

I just checked DIY's site and they recommend 3.0-3.5ms for these. Should have looked there first I guess!

Oh and no matter how many times you click the test port thingy in TS, it will never find the MS on any COM port if the 9 pin is not plugged in!

[BBR]

I realized I missed explaining some stuff.



This is where I began. This is the old GM style HEI distributor that has served fairly well for 5 or 6 years. It worked, but was not terribly accurate and lately it was beginning to do some flaky things.



This is the base for a billet distributor that I once used for a short time. It had it's own basket of weirdness so I went back to the HEI. This needed to be in place so the oil pump would still function. I removed everything but the shaft and fitted a..... can anyone guess? That is the top half of a wheel centercap (circa 1990) when fake knockoffs were popular. I trimmed it off and screwed it in place. This distributor uses the same 2 piece shaft that the HEI dist did, so all I had to do was drop it in and bolt it down.



The bracket that Bill used on his A460 headed, tunnel rammed BBF with a belt drive did not fit my engine very well. I had to add a hole, trim the motor plate a bit, and bend it, so it was more low profile. Aluminum plate is hard to bend by hand, so I used the hydraulic press. Worked awesome.

[BBR]

IT RUNS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Went out this morning, checked the settings in the MS, turned the key and it lit-off perfectly. Checked the timing with the light and it is dead nuts on and super stable! Yeeeeeeeeesssssssss!!!!!

[SuperBuickGuy]

Isn't that the most awesome feeling ever? congratulations - I've started lots of cars, I even remember my 1st car motor that I built that ran - but that moment paled in comparison to the moment I made my first EFI motor run. congratulations!

[BBR]

I have spent most of the day working on home improvement projects while constantly thinking about where to tap in for a tach signal. I wanted to to be clean and simple without a bunch or wires running everywhere. Then it hit me. Integrate it with the Igniter. So that's what I did, to an extent.



This is the output side of the coil igniter that attaches to the coils. The igniter simply receives signals from the 4 low power spark leads from the Megasquirt and uses those signals to ground the coils at the appropriate time and for the appropriate length of time. Basically an electronic relay. These 4 outputs are where I need to tap in to generate a tach signal. Since there are 4 empty slots on this output side, I decided to use them for my 4 tach leads.



I jumpered the solder lugs with the 4 diodes the circuit calls for.



This created 4 tach outputs. I didn't get a pic of it, but then I took 4 strands of wire and soldered them to one end of the zener diode and a single wire on the other end. That wire was then connected to the stock tach lead. Boom. We have a working tach again.

[Russell]

Pretty cool, does this version have and data loging? With some tuning I bet you can improve part throttle efficiency.

[BBR]

Yes it will data log but I only have a few things connected to the Megasquirt so there wouldn't be a whole lot of info there.

[Russell]

Can't remember do you have a wide band O2? RPM, load, O2, spark advance. What else would need to dial in tr he timing curve?

[BBR]

I do have a wide band on the car, but it is not connected to the MS just yet. I may add more functionality to it as time goes on.

[TheSilverBuick]

Excellent solution! Thanks for the pictures!

[BBR]

I keep watching the start up video over and over. Haha. The starting retard makes it start so easy now.

[TheSilverBuick]

I think people underestimate some of the advantages of even just ignition control, especially in high compression engines.

[BBR]

Might go ahead and hook up the O2 to the MS. It would certainly be nice to be able to datalog O2. Haha #andsoitbegins