I'm certainly open to investigating coils and small batteries that I'm not yet familiar with. Because mag wear-related issues are eliminated and mag drive wear is well tolerated, the Sparkbox can be transferred from one engine to another and still work well. It's also for those who (like me) would rather put their budget toward another engine rather than another mag. Ultimately the Sparkbox is intended for those who'd rather fix the engine than fix the magneto. I may re-evaluate grill igniters when I can find one that is satisfactory. Should a repair ever be needed, I want our customers to be able to use commonly available components. The small coils of good quality I've found are about 3x the cost of the one I chose, may not be as readily available and are certainly not as heavy. I've looked at using grill igniters and smaller coils from model gas engines and airplanes to get more room in there. An internal battery kept getting bumped over other important features. It's a challenge to both predict and then also make work every possible desire, so I chose design criteria that I thought were the most important, with emphasis on quality along the way. That opens up a whole new process of researching, sourcing and testing for quality, so for now I have opted for an external battery which the customer can choose. If or when I find the elusive small batteries that both fit and work well, I'd also pack in a charging jack to avoid removing the cover to change them. For now I'm also keeping in mind customers who may find it disagreeable to change batteries. I will be posting videos to our new Youtube channel, farmachinist Īgreed, a smaller battery like a 9V may work for some time, but even with something that small, space to pack it in the box remains the issue.
Sparkbox ek manual#
Included with the SPARKBOX is a multi-page, illustrated owner's manual and limited warranty. Given all the things needing to work together for a saleable unit, an external battery is a reasonable compromise. I wanted anyone to be able to work on it many years from now, with repair parts easily and inexpensively obtained. To stay within all these criteria and many others, special electronics including a hall effect sensor were ruled out in favor of the simple, time-tested circuit of coil and condenser, using a microswitch instead of breaker points. cost-effective to keep the total price competitive easy to understand and work on for novice and experienced collectors alike reliable, durable (withstand 100 hours minimum testing) sized to fit within a box the size of an EK With that overcome, I had to source electrical components that are: I designed a small and simple mechanism inside the box to accomplish that. drive types so engine timing adjustment is performed as with the EK.
Smaller batteries may work as well, but what I've found so far won't fit inside and still give the desired performance.Ī huge challenge was to make the device work with all three mag. Now, a small $5 lantern battery will operate my device (which I call the "SPARKBOX") for a long time without fail. Back in the day a magneto was attractive, in part, to get away from the poor endurance of dry cells. However, getting everything to fit was like stuffing 10 lbs into a 5 lb box.
I continually pursued that goal as part of the design. Great comments and I agree, a completely self contained unit would be ideal. I’d be happy to answer your questions here, by p.m. You can find more info at our website (). It eliminates EK problems like "it works on the bench but not on the engine."
Sparkbox ek plus#
However, as others have suggested- it’s all brand new, it makes a good backup ignition plus a test device to rule out magneto problems. I realize the purist may scoff at a battery powered EK alternative or say “why not just buy an EK and rebuild it” etc. I designed it to keep the price competitive with a used EK. The unique mechanism inside enables it to work on all mag drive types. It tolerates mag drive wear and works equally well on my different engines. It uses 6 volt external (lantern) battery with a simple coil, condenser and microswitch circuit. The device mounts like the EK and is the same size. Over the last 15 months I've invested many hours in engineering and experimenting to refine a solution suitable for others. Researching Stak and elsewhere, I found I was not alone in this situation and eventually decided to develop a true EK alternative that works on all engines that use the EK. With limited budget and short on time, I just wanted to fix the engine enough to run. Since I didn’t have a working magneto, I rigged up a buzz coil arrangement. Several years ago I acquired my first engine that uses a Wico EK, an Economy S.
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