Saving Old Seagulls

Charles uk wrote: call me old fasioned if you like but a couple of miles is a long way to row!

But not too bad if you are being towed.

H-A

I've been looking around for a coil for my Anzani Unitwin, and came across this Villiers coil. NOS £30 plus VAT. Part number is 1147x9.

After Charle's post re different magneto arrangements, I was wondering if this is the one that goes on the Brittannia? It seems to have 2 outputs, so must have 2 x secondary coils. I'm not sure of any other twins with Villiers magnetos, apart from the Marston twin of course.

If anybody is after one of these I'll point you towards it.

Could do with one of them my self.

But more like £40 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Villiers-HT-Coil/dp/B0051NUALA

Same firm but via amazon!

I halve never seen a coil with two secondaries ..it is very common to have a double ended secondary with a plug on each end...if your car does not have coil on plug that will be one system it could use ..originally devised by the french for the 2CV one plug is neg earth and the other pos earth.

The 2CV I had, J reg the first time around & bright yellow, had a waisted spark ignition firing every every rotation on both plugs, I never realy thought about the logic of it but it would make sense for the spark to have to jump two plugs in series, unlike Oyster's Anzani that has lost the spark on only 1 cylinder.

Hi Guys - sorry I've been off-line for a short while - been in and out of hospital with a gammy leg.
The latest state of play from this end is: the cut-price power transistors from the States never arrived. Vendor swears he sent 'em, but I always suspected that the amount paid would never have covered the air fare. So that's that.

But - I haven't been in bed asleep 100% of the time ....

Been doing some research on Nova modules: although these are badged by several companies, the original manufacturer is ROTARY CORPORATION (http://www.rotarycorp.com), and their catalog part numbers for the ignition modules are: 8786 (reversible polarity - 2 terminals) and 9334 (fixed polarity - one terminal, the case being the other). The 9334 may look rather familiar ... ?
Are these suitable for general modification ? Well - probably - but I've emailed tech support at Rotary to sound them out about ageing Villiers coils and Wipac's inbuilt capacitor. Will report back if/when they reply. It may turn out to be a 'suck it and see' situation.

Availability ? Well, here's the good news - although some vendors are flogging these at upwards of £20, I've found a source for a fiver (one-off price) plus £2 postage. And even though I've not heard from Rotary yet, I bought one of these this morning, and will test it as soon as I'm more mobile. Then, depending on results, I'll enquire about a bulk purchase price. Could be interesting.


One last comment: in order to cover their backsides, some vendors are cautioning that these modules can only be used in magnetos with one magnet, and that multiple magnets are verbotten.

The manufacturer says (sorry about the caps): "THE NOVA MODULE IS SUITABLE FOR 2 AND 3 LEG IGNITION COILS IN SINGLE CYLINDER ENGINES. THIS MODULE IS NOT RECOMMENDED FOR USE ON ENGINES EQUIPPED WITH BATTERY IGNITION OR FLYWHEELS WITH MULTIPLE MAGNETS." By 'multiple magnets', they are referring to magnetos with half a dozen magnets spread around the flywheel used to charge a battery (which would then generate half a dozen sparks per rev). One pair of magnets is fine.

These look the same as the 9334. They were fitted to Victa 2stroke lawnmowers here in Australia. Ive managed to salvage a few from the local scrap merchant. In there day the modules from a Victa dealer was around $50 quite expesive back then. They were pop riveted to the crankcase, If not well heatsinked they got quite hot & failed.

Hi Daryl - that's a bummer ...

I've done a fair bit of Googling around re: the Nova - mainly lawnmower/ chainsaw/ snow blower sites - and the consensus seems to be that these modules are ok. However, at least one guy commented that he had found their reliability to be not as good as the original Atom. Perhaps overheating is the reason why ?

Ok - Rotary's Tech Support guy has replied and he doesn't foresee any problems with the Villiers coil set-up. However, with regard to the Wipac coil with built-in capacitor, they have had no experience with such a system, but he's "inclined to believe that our 8786 will not work". He also comments "I have no idea if experimental testing would damage the module".

So - his comments are pretty-much in line with what we already know: Villiers OK. Wipac maybe.

Time for 'suck it and see'.

Well buying these things takes all the enjoyment out of it ........The guy in Aylesbury( e bay) is not selling any of the units in your photos.....not the metal cased Nova 2 so we can assume its Nova 1.....he seems to want £5 each + post £2 up to 5 and will trade "off ebay" ie direct...but if it buggers up what come back do you have ?...Pay pal refund ??..so why did they change from nova 1 to nova 2 ?? ..If you buy these £5 ones I think they want bolting down with some heat sink compound ...like you say suck it and see..

Top Cat wrote:Well buying these things takes all the enjoyment out of it ........

Well, that's quite true - but speaking for myself this is only an interesting 'what if' experiment anyway. I'm not entirely convinced that modifying something that already works without problems is really justified. And if complete units can be bought for the same or less than the cost of the components ...

The guy in Aylesbury( e bay) is not selling any of the units in your photos.....

I think you'll find he is. meadowbrook_enterprises' (#150698581483) is the same as Rotary Corporation's 8786.

not so ..the 8786 is the full metal jacket Nova 2 ..Meadow brook are selling a bare chip on a heatsink.....I suspect thats Nova 1 ...maybe they had overheating problems if not properly mounted .....Well at least we can see its a purposed designed chip so should have the apprpriate voltage ratings....at 5 quid its cheaper than the RS 500v transistor so maybe thats the way to go ...Missed the e bay auction last night ......doh....

Top Cat wrote:not so ..the 8786 is the full metal jacket Nova 2 ..Meadow brook are selling a bare chip on a heatsink.....I suspect thats Nova 1 ...

What you are seeing in the Meadowbrook photograph is not 'a bare chip', but black potting compound which has been poured into a cast aluminium heatsink - i.e. you are seeing the 'rear view' of the module.

Had a bit of a break through with finding a suitable switching transistor for this unit. I discovered 2SD1071 transistors were used in a Kawasaki motorbike ign system. It has a rating of 450V & works well in the circuit with Wipac & Villiers coils. The 2SD1071 transistors are quite cheep on Ebay, I purchased 10 for $8.

Construction.