Construction


Magneto Ignition Harness and Prop Safety Wire

As my engine isn’t exactly standard, i’ve had to modify the ignition harness – because, well I didn’t have one! I bought the experimental one form Aircraft Spruce, but i then had to make it to the bendix plate. This required some experimentation and thought. The harness was originally attached with screws. The new high flex wires won’t allow that to work. The kit supplied by acs has small hollow pop rivets that get crimped onto the ends. The problem is, there is a rubber piece that has to have the wire through first before you can fix the ends on the leads. The end solution was I needed to slice the rubber, attach the cimped ends, and then re-insert. Given the shape of the bendix attachment This should be plenty secure.

I also had to route the ignition leads. I originally had the magneto aircraft plugs on the top of the engine and the autoplugs on the bottom. But, ease of access made this a bad idea. So i had to reverse.

I also safety wired the prop. Which, while painful, isn’t as bad as some folks made it out to be. Granted, there were a couple that I had to redo more than once…


FWF Wire Routing and Termination

This post encompasses multiple shop sessions. Its pretty hard to fully detail wire routing… and boring. But the gist is this. I ran a lot of wires, in a lot of variations before setting on the appropriate routes, bundles, and points to secure. Here are some photos of the process and results.

Here you can see the wiring for the flap motor and flap position sensor. I wanted to keep the wires out of the way but provide flexibility for moment. I marked the bottom and top locations of moment, and then positioned the wire mounting point midway. This enabled a shorter length of wire for movement and less opportunity for it to become entangled.

A ton of work in figuring out the routing of ignition leads and engine sensors. I played with multiple configurations before finding the appropriate lengths for the ignition harness off the magneto.

The ignition leads for the ElectroAir EI were much easier. First they were just going to the top of the engine, and second I could cut them to length! Unlike the ACS provided leads for the Bendix Mag.

I increased the security of the air filter bypass cable with an additional adel clamp.

I used a loose adel clamp to ensure the throttle cable did not rub the fuel line or engine mount.

A lot of fiddling to get the starter wire to route without interference and the appropriate amount of slack.

Wiring for the GEA24, the ElectroAir EI ECU, and the fuel pump is a major pain in the butt. I am happy with the choice of location as it does reduce the length of wire runs and makes good use of otherwise wasted space. But from a serviceability aspect, this is a major pain in the ass.


Heat Muff Installation

The heat muff provided by Van’s has the inlet and the outlet on the same side of the heat muff. For my installation this would not work. I tried every conceivable location for the heat muff. Without building a new custom muff, the only location that would work was coming off the #1 exhaust. This was fortunate for the air inlet, but not great for the outlet back to the firewall.

I cut the muff in two, and used another band of aluminum to tie the two halves back together, but with the inlet and outlet rotated appropriately for my geometry.

I also filled the heat muff with stainless steel wool. This should slow the air velocity down and also improve heat transfer surface area. The end result should be hotter more effective winter time heat in the cockpit.