Vipec And Frying Igniters

[Scooby]

G'day

Just wondering if many people have had issues with frying igniters when using Vipec? Might not be a related problem but there's two I know of now and I'm trying to get a feel for whether this is common.

Not trying to criticise the Vipec, I'm very happy with mine.

I know igniters die from heat and age but I'm interested to see if there's a few dying when a Vipec is involved.

Related thread here

http://www.skylinesaustralia.com/forums/R3...rs-t340484.html

Thanks

Edited October 17, 2010 by Scooby

[DVS JEZ]

my old tuner killed my ignitor when we put a vi-pec v44, ran for a little bit then died, this was on my old s13 sr20det.

put in a microtech x4 ignitor and not sure if he changed any settings but it has run ever since, he tried to blame the heat and its age etc but i really dont believe it, was too coincidental.

[Trozzle]

I'm running a v44, haven't driven the car much since installation though due to boost issues. I've resolved those as of yesterday (touches wood) so I'll be driving it a lot more soon, will find out if I join the fried igniter club.

[T04GTR]

my guess is the dwell is set to long and overheating the igniter circuit.

[Scooby]

Dave do you think dwell would specifically kill the earth circuit in the igniter? BoostdBarge pulled his apart and in each case the earth circuit had gone. Soldered it up and all's been good for a long while.

I guess the earth circuit works harder than the rest as it's loaded 6:1 every time a cylinder fires and with wasted spark it's even worse. So with excessive dwell it'd be under signficant load.

DVS32R what circumstances did yours die under ie cruise, idle, boost etc?

I don't expect there's going to be a mass of people with this issue, but a few is enough to suggest more than a coincidence.

Edited October 17, 2010 by Scooby

[DVS JEZ]

I agree 100% with dave.

Mine died on idle not long after we got it running.

[TiTAN]

mine has been running fine for more than a year.

[Guilt-Toy]

Ditch your coils and ignitors and run LS1 coils.

This issue has been found on other skyline forums as well, the stock ignitor will need to tuned wit dewell time before you can get more use out of them but they apparently still die even when you get the settings right.

also remember this is a wasted spark system. the coils / ignitor is running harder then it would in a common standard ECU situation that has direct fire for all coils at once.

Extra fire from wasted spark = extra heat = extra problems with weak earthsinside the ignitor, im sure nissan did not design everything to run a 200% speed so old age and turning up the ante with wasted spark explains why.

LS1 or LS2 coils are the go.

I seen standard coils run fine up to 400hp at wheels, i upgraded to the vipec and found lots of problems with spark blowing out no matter what i did.

Replaced coils with LS1's and problem was solved.

if you wired in a v88 im sure this problem will be seen rarely.

[DVS JEZ]

Anth why do u say v88 shouldnt see this happen?

How hard is it too wire ls1 coils in?

[Trozzle]

V88 isn't running wasted spark like the V44 on a 6 cylinder. V44 has 4 ignition outputs, V88 has 8.

[Proximity Motorsport]

I had a vipec and a Morrison? Ignighter... And I never have had a problem in 12 months - 15,000km

[BoostedBarge]

As mentioned, I have fried a few of these. Even a brand new one from Nissan ($750 worth!)... I've reduced the dwell, put in Splitfire coil packs and soldered the burnt out ground and haven't had a problem for a year now. Anyone know of any other wasted-spark setups that are burning out ignitors?

Pics of the inners of the ignitor and the fix here:

http://www.skylinesaustralia.com/forums/Ca...67#entry4875367

[Scooby]

Ok spoke to Ray Hall, extremely helpful as usual. Emailed him the map and he was on the phone 10 mins later, confirmed the dwell is fine, if anything a touch on the conservative side.

Asked about the V88 and he said it would allow more dwell but he doesn't believe the V44 is the cause in any case so nothing to be gained by switching to V88 his view.

He suggested it's most likely either a voltage spike, in which case the ecu would probably have been fried, or a poor earth, and to call Mark at Godzilla motorsport. Again, Mark was really helpful. He also suggested a poor earth.

[T04GTR]

there is nothing wrong with the vipec, its just my guess that the default dwell setting is to long, more dwell = more spark but hotter running. less dwell gives a weaker spark but nicer on the drivers.

i burnt out 2x bosch 008 igniters with my old autronic before i worked it out..

im fairly sure stock dwell time is around 2ms most people run up to 3.5ms without dramas.

[Scooby]

mine is set at 1.7 m/s, Ray recommended 1.8 so relatively low.

[BoostedBarge]

Mine was a bit over 2ms. We reduced it to around 1.7 I think. It still fried after that, so it doesn't seem to be dwell that's the problem. Good idea to check your ground. I measured mine and also pulled the coil pack loom apart and re-taped it. Couldn't find any issues. Very strange...

Scooby, so you're in Brissy? Me too. I could probably fix the coilpack for you if you want.

[Scooby]

Thanks Simon I'm actually in Canberra, Ray suggested Mark only because of his experience. Opening the blown modules is on the to do list. I agree it's probably not dwell, the new module has three earth points and a dedicated heatsink so we'll see how it goes.

[T04GTR]

what are the dwell settings you have at the moment. and im corected the stock dwell is 1ms..

[TiTAN]

my dwell is set to 2ms 0-2000 1.9ms 2500-5000 1.8ms 6000+

no problems with my ignitor.

[Scooby]

I'm backing a bad earth since it was running fine for so long and then popped.

Will rack up some km and see what happens.