Vertical Power/Panel Upgrade to Vans RV-4

Elevator Counterweights and skins

2009-01-02T23:01:00.001-07:00

Elevator counterweights were trimmed from rectangular blocks of lead from Vans aircraft. The first one took about 1200 strokes of my vixen file to smooth into the correct shape. I found out on the others that I could use a hacksaw blade to make the preliminary cut and save a lot of time and filing!

The elevator counterweight skins were clamped into place for for drilling to the counterweight spar underneath.

Top of counterweight skin drilled and clecoed.

Trim Tab... 2nd Day

2009-01-01T18:28:00.016-07:00

The electric trim motor from Ray Allen comes with two rods. The shorter one works on the RV-6. The RV-4 takes the longer rod. I had to trim 1 1/4" off the longer rod.

Adjusting the length and interference on the elevator skin with the old trim tab.

I added an extra piece of .032 alumimum to the tab arm. It takes most of the slack between the sides of the clevis arms and najes the tab arm a little stronger. Not necessary according to the plans, but I am trying to eliminate all slop in the trim system that I can. It should help with the altitude hold.

A battery from a cordless drill makes a great 12 volt source for running the electric trim motor back and forth.

Tab arm is riveted to trim tab. Plans call for MD-42BS pop rivets. I was able to use AN426-4 rivets because I had not riveted the top of the trim tab yet.

Trim tab complete, installed on wing and adjusted for length.

Left Elevator 6th day and Trim Tab Assembly

2008-12-31T18:24:00.012-07:00

My solution from yesterdays problem of riveting the trim tab spar and piano hinge was to take a squeezer die and cut off the shaft. After smoothing off the bottom of the die, I superglued it to my no-hole yoke as shown in the picture below.

This worked great and kept the yoke from bending the piano hinge.

I decided to add a couple of stiffeners to the trim tab as is done with the elevators. The plans dont call for them; however, our old trim tab had flexed a little so maybe this will help the new trim tab.

Lining up the new tab against the piano hinge to make sure the trim tab edge line will match the edge line of the elevator.

Drilling the piano hinge to the trim tab.

Drilling the trim tab spar to the top of the trim tab.

Deburred, dimpled and primed everything.

Almost finished trim tab. The top wont be riveted until the two pieces of angle that attach to the trim motor arm are riveted to the trim tab tomorrow.

Left Elevator... 5th day

2008-12-30T18:15:00.001-07:00

Drilled hole in spar for the 5 wires that go to the electric trim motor and put in a plastic grommet.

Drilled and cleoced the piano hinge that holds the trim tab. Plans call for AN257-p2, however, the AN257-P3 piano hinge (a little deeper hinge) fit better so that is what I used.

A problem came up in riveting the piano hinge to the spar. The heads on the piano hinge interfer with the squeezer because they are lower than the rivet. If I turned the piano hinge over, it would work fine, but the top of the piano hinge would protrude a little above the elevator. Going to quit for the evening and research how to fix this.

Left Elevator Continued..4th day

2008-12-29T22:02:00.008-07:00

Laid out the lines on the aluminum cut from the left elevator to make the trim tab from.
Cut out rough shape using hand shears.

Installed spar skeleton into skins and started all the prep work that needed to be finished before riveting. Finished drilling and dimpling all holes into skeleton.

Cut edges from leading edge for the counterweight rib skins will go.

Cut edges from leading edges for where the horizontal stabilizer attach brackts will mate with the rod end bearings on the elevator. Skins are cut 1/8 inch undersize on each end. Final cuts will be made after leading edge skin is rolled and pop riveted together.

Left elevator is ready for final riveting. Am going to go home and review all plans to make sure I didnt overlook anything before riveting elevator skin to spar skeleton tomorrow.

Left Elevator Continued..3rd day

2008-12-28T21:41:00.001-07:00

Drilled electric trim brace to elevator skin.
Drilled holes at each corner of cutout and enlarged with unibit.

I used a cutoff wheel to cut between each of the holes.

Preliminary hole shaped. Now lots of filing and sanding and shaping to get it to final shape.

Since the bracket for the RV-6 is the same as for the RV-4, borrowed the bracket and motor from the RV-6 and used it as a template to cut the outer shape into the elevator skin and as a guide for the holes for the 7 screws that will hold the bracket and motor to the elevator.

Hole in skin was cut the same way as the electric trim brace. Drill a hole at each corner , use a cutoff wheel to cut between the holes and then file and sand to final shape.

K1100-6 countersunk platenuts are attached to the electric trim bracket .

Platenuts attached. Now time to prime and backrivet plate to skin.

Electric trim bracket riveted to skin and motor and cover temporarilly installed. Everything fits ok. Whew! I have to remember to drill a hole in the spar behind the motor because as it retracts the shaft extends backwards from the motor and will hit against the spar unless a hole is drilled for it to extend through.

Time to call it a night and head home to barbarque some steaks on the new grill.

Left Elevator Continued...2nd day

2008-12-27T21:24:00.002-07:00

Cut the aluminum from the left elevator skin to make the trim tab. If I cut it wrong, I will have to start over on the left elevator.

Finished drilling holes for stiffeners and spar.
I used the same template I made for the right elevator which saved some time.

Fabricated the stiffeners from 3/4 x 3/4 x .032 angle and drilled to skins.

Primed elevator skin and stiffeners and riveted stiffeners to skin.

Taped 1/8 in metal rod to bend in skin and used home made brake to finish bend in elevator skin.

Riveted left elevator horn to spar.

Started laying out brace for electric trim option for elevator.
Vans traced out opening on sheet of aluminum. You have to cut it out yourself.
Somehow I either lost of didnt order the plans for the electric trim option so am using the plans from the RV-6 to fab the trim on the RV-4 elevator.

Left Elevator Started

2008-12-26T20:24:00.002-07:00

Started the left elevator today. Its pretty much a duplicate of making the right elevator except for the addition of the trim tab which is cut out from the elevator skin.
Stiffeners are fabbed and clecoed to the skin.

Spar skeleton is fabbed, primed and test fitted to skin. The inner rib is shortened to make room for the trim tab to fit below it.

Right Elevator Continued ...5th day

2008-12-25T20:03:00.002-07:00

Riveted the inner rib to the spar.

Riveted on the elevator horn to the spar.

Attaching the outer ribs that hold the counterweights to the spar.

Set the elevator skin and spar skeleton in the jig and started drilling the spar to the skins.

The inner ribs are too small to dimple normally. The Avery vise grip dimpling tool is a vise grip with the two mating dimpler parts welded onto the vise grip jaws. Works great.

Heavy rain on Christmas Day started pouring in the hanger door as well as creating a deafening cacophony of sound that reverberated off the roof.

Started final riveting.

The no hole yoke head came in handy to finish riveting at each end of the ribs where there wasnt much room.

The left elevator is test fitted onto the horizontal stabilizer.
The gap between the counterweight ribs and the horizontal stabilizer looks about right.

Right Elevator Continued ...4th day

2008-12-24T13:35:00.005-07:00

Christmas Eve here so only worked for a few hours.
Started by dimpling all of the holes for the spar on the elevator skin. The pnuematic squeezer makes it easy. I had to use the 4" head to reach all of the rivet holes.

Primed and painted both the left and right elevator horns while I had the painted mixed. A finish coat of PPG DAR pairnt was put over the primer to make sure no corrosion happens to the steel horns. I will let them dry overnight before riveting the right horn to the elevator spar.

Started laying out the stiffeners for the left elevator.

Right Elevator Continued ...3rd day

2008-12-22T18:27:00.013-07:00

A template was made from 3/4 in angle for the holes that need to be drilled in the elevator skin that mate to the spar.

The template was clamped the each side of the elevator skins and used to drill the spar attach holes into the skin.

A piece of .032 2024-t3aluminum was used to make the two bands of aluminum that go over the tip of the elevator that projects forward to hold the counterweights.

Since the tips are angles, the pieces look like long boomerangs until they are bent in the middle.

Ready for test fitting. Pieces were cut 1/4 in oversize and over length. Final fitting will determine actual size and length.

The pieces of the spar skeleton were matched up, fluted and drilled.

The elevator horn was drilled to the spar. Since the spar tapers through the full length, it was hard to get the elevator horn square. The edge of the table was used as one side and the spar was clamped parallel to the table. A 90 degree carpenters square could then be placed on the table edge and the other end of the square was used to line up the horn.

The spar was temporarally attached to the horizontal stabilizer to get the exact distances needed for the rod end bearing and ribs.

A sharpie was used to draw a line down the center of the spar where the holes would be drilled.
The spar was then inserted into the skin to where the sharpie line could be seen through the center of the holes and clamped and drilled.

Right Elevator Continued ...2nd day

2008-12-21T07:23:00.010-07:00

Vans plans call for making a bending brake fromtwo 2 X 8s joined together by hinges. I decided to use my table top as one side of the brake instead. This would give me a stable surface to rest the elevator skins on. So I bolted one side of the hinges directly to the table.

I put an 1/8" rod at the skin bend and taped it in. This is to keep from over bending the skin.

Below is a picture of the elevator skin in the brake. The brake is about 4"s longer than the elevator skin on either side to use a grips to push down on. The actual bending was quite easy.

Below is the skin at the joint.

The next step is to buid the jig that supports the elevator while riveting the elevator frame to the skin. This is real important to get aligned correctily or you can get a twist in the end of the elevator. I had evidently discarded the particle board V-jigs when I moved hangers so I had to take a trip to Lowes to pick up a piece of 2' x 2' x 3/4" plywood to cut into 3 V-jigs. Fortunately, Vans supplies a drawing for the V-jigs if you need to make your own.

New Elevators for 53L part 1

2008-12-17T20:37:00.006-07:00

The elevators on 53L were found to have a severe twist in them from the original builder. This was offset with a large trim tab on the vertical stabilizer. We decided to remake the elevators to remove the twist and replace the .016 skins with .020 skins as many people have reported cracking in the thinnner skins.

The parts from Vans are pretty basic. No holes in the skins like the RV-6 elevator skins, and pieces of aluminum to fabricate brackets from. The elevator horns did come with some lightening holes in them, but not powdercoated as I understand is done with the steel parts on the over higher number RVs.
A lot of time was spent in laying out the lines on the skins to make sure everything was going to line up correctly. Then the stiffeners need to be measured for each position and cut from the supplied 4' sections of angle. The angles have to be cut at an angle at one end when it fits into the tip of the elevator. I used a jig on the drill press to make sure that each hole is in line on the angle.
First row of stiffeners clecoed to the elevator skin.
The other side of the elevator skins was done exactly the same as the first side.
After removing all of the stiffeners, the holes were deburred then it was time to dimple the skins. I use the C frame tool from Averys for this procedure.

Then dimple all of the stiffeners.
Next is to rough up all surfaces with scotchbrite pad, clean and prime parts.
After drying, the stiffeners are back-riveting to the skin.
I put all the rivets for one side in at a time and cover with tape.

Between the heavy steel plate under the skin and the back riveting tool for the rivet gun, the riveting went really fast.

VP-50 Installation

2008-11-24T18:44:00.000-07:00

I am at the point when I had to make a commitment to the wiring in the new RV-6a I am finishing. About this time, the VP-50 was getting close to shipping and Marc Ausman at Vertical Power approached me about beta testing it since I had beta tested the VP-100. I downloaded the VP-50 load planning worksheet from the Vertical Power website that is used to assign wiring and power to all of the electrical equipment and found out that the VP-50 would work find in the RV-4.
So, the long story short is that I decided to remove the VP-100 from the RV-4 and put it in the RV-6a and put the new VP-50 in the RV-4.
I had a large amount of wiring left over from the installation kit for the VP-100 so I didnt need a complete wiring installation kit for the conversion. Marc loaned me the crimping tool for the connectors that the Control box uses so I could crimp my own connectors.
I started on a Saturday morning and was operational by noon on Sunday, including talking with several visitors who came by the hanger to check out what was happening.
I was hoping that the VP-50 box pattern was as the same as the VP-100 but the VP-50 box is slightly smaller. I had to redo the brackets that attach the VP-50 to the angles in front of the instrument panel. This took several hours to make new brackets, install platenuts, and prime.

The actual wiring was extremely easy as I used my old load planning and new load planning spreadsheets to remove the power pins from connectors one by one and either use them as is in the new connectors or redo the power and ground connects to the various avionics equipment.
The VP-50 doesnt have all of the features of the VP-100 so I had to reinstall my master switch and flap switch. As I still had them available, it was simple to redo them. I had to drill a new whole in the panel to the right of the last switch on the VP-50 switch panel for the flap switch.

Here is the finished panel with the VP-50 installed. The Trio AP was also removed to be installed in the RV-6a and replaced with a Dynon AP for RV4chicks simple VFR fun plane.

Dynon Lean of Peak

2008-06-01T20:54:00.003-07:00

We flew to Sedona, AZ for breakfast this morning. On the way there, I was playing with the leaning mode in the Dynon EMS. I was able to get the engine lean of peak without running rough which I hear is pretty rare on carburated engines. I attribute it to the new10-5217 carb that we installed last year. It runs lots smoother and uses less gas than our previous carb. I had noticed that the rpm will decline when leaning before it gets rough so thought it might run LOP. We were told that the 10-5217 incorporates an atomizer on it that more evenly distributes the gas into the incoming air.
Heres proof.

We were still climbing in this picture. I leveled off at 7500 feet and was able to get the gph down to 58% hp, 6.1 to 6.3 gph at 2350 rpm and 170 mph TAS.
This would give us a range of over 6 hours in our RV-4 (41 gal tanks). We were showing about 22 nautical mpg. Will try this at 10k to 12k and see what happens at the higher altitudes.

Trio Autopilot ReInstalled.

2008-01-08T18:39:00.001-07:00

The Trio Autopilot was reinstalled into the panel.

12/16 First Flight with new panel

2007-12-16T18:04:00.000-07:00

Dynon repaired the EMS-d10 (solder joint problem) and returned it Friday afternoon so we were able to get everything installed again this weekend. I removed the Trio Autopilot to send back to Trio to get the latest firmware updates. I also removed the panel on Saturday and painted it black (the color RV4chick requested).

The RV-4 is ready to go after being down for so long.

We flew to Casa Grande for some cheaper fuel (4.17) versus >5.00 and then to Marana Regional for lunch and then back to Phoenix. Total time about 1.5 hours.
Dynon tries to preserve your settings when you send a unit back, but with mine all of the settings were wiped out so I have to reprogram then because I had not downloaded them to a laptop yet as Dynon suggests. I will definately do that when I get everything reprofiled.
Everything went well. It was really neat to see the TAS, density altitude and relative winds aloft on the Dynons. It felt very strange to fly with the digital readouts instead of analog gauges. Its going to take some time for us to get comfortable with the new setup. One thing that the Dynon EMS showed us was a 60 degree difference between our hottest and coolest cylinder in flight. We will have to redo the baffles to try to get the temperatures evened out.
The VP-100 worked great. It showed about 6 amps being used with all normal daytime avionics powered up in flight including strobes.

This week I will work on recalibrating everything for the Dynons again and making backups so I can restore the settings in the future if needed. I am also ordering the backup battery from Dynon for the EFIS. This coming weekend RV4chick will finally get to fly her RV-4 after all of the changes I made to it and I can get back to finishing the other RV-4 I am currently building. Hope she likes it.

12/9 VP-100 Start Up Sequence

2007-12-09T19:50:00.001-07:00

I thought that while I was waiting for the Engine monitor to arrive, I would show how I use the VP-100 during engine start.
I have decided my start sequence is with all buttons on the VP-100 switch panel turned off.
The first step to to press and release the button on the VP-100 switch panel to turn on the VP-100. The VP-100 goes thru its test sequence and then shows the current volts and amps being used and the button turns green.

The next step is to run the boost pump which primes the line to the carburator. I currently have the boost pump on switch 3, but it can be programmed to any of the buttons. You can see that my volts dropped from 12 volts to 11.7 and the amps increased from .5 to 1.3 amps while running the boost pump.

The next steps are mixture rich, crack the throttle and use the keyed ignition switch to start the engine. When the engine starts, I move the first switch from its center position to the up position. This engages the primary alternator. If I moved the first switch to the down position, it would engage the backup alternator.
The volts now show 14.4 volts and indicate that the alternator is charging the battery.

Turning on switch 2 engages the rest of the avionics. The switches have a colored led in the tip of the switch. A green light indicates there are no problems with the circuits that are controlled by the switch. If there is a problem, the led at the end of the switch turns red.

With every light and avionics engaged, the RV-4 uses 24.6 amps. The Plane Power 60 amp alternator should be able to handle this load with no problem.

For shutting down, I turn every switch off and then mixture to idle to stop the engine and mags off.

Final step is to hold the button on the VP-100 in for about 3 seconds and then the VP-100 turns off.
The starting sequence is really not that much different from our old system, but for the first time, we am really aware of what is going on with the electrical system. If any problems show up, the VP-100 will alert us immediately. Between its monitoring of the electrical system and the engine monitoring of the Dynon EMS, and the Garmin 496 audio warnings, hopefully, we will know right away when any problems occur and we can spend more time looking outside the cockpit instead of at the instruments.

12/8 Garmin 496 audio hookup

2007-12-08T19:30:00.001-07:00

When I went to the airport last Sunday to fly, the Dynon EMS would not boot up. So I overnighted it to them last Monday. I am expecting it back this week so we should finally be able to get 53L back in the air.
I decided to hook up the audio output from the Garming 496 to the intercom while we am waiting. The Garmin 496 outputs a stereo signal through a 1/8 " stereo female connector on the back of it. Since my PS1000 II intercom is mono, I needed to adapt to it.
This required a trip to Radio Shack to pick up a 1/8 stereo male to male extension and a 1/8 female stereo to 1/8 male mono jack.

Its only a short distance from the Garmin 496 to the aux jack for the intercom so I didnt need a very long cable. Radio Shack had a 1 ft connector so I was in luck.

The "Sound" setup menu for the Garmin controls the sound options.
I turned the Audio Volume up about 3/4 of the way and turned the Terrain Audio to On.
I left the TIS Audio off since I dont have a mode S transponder connected yet.
The Audio Jack option has two settings Headphones or Line Out. I used the Headphones settings and a set of Sony Walkman ear buds to test the sound, but changed the setting to Line Out for the connection to the intercom.

The next screen shows the "XM" setup. We havent activated the XM music subscription yet, but there are still 4 channels that you can receive without a subscription. A preview, news, sports and emergency alert channel. These channels work real good to test the audio output.
When you press the "Menu" key while in this screen, an option pops up that lets you mute or enable the sound.

The audio output worked great on the PS1000 II intercom. Whenever a radio transmission is received it mutes the audio from the GPS and then gradually increases the volume back to the original level after the radio transmission ceases.
Alerts will also sound through the intercom. Garmin uses a female voice to announce the alerts as well as a tone.

11/29 Garmin 496 Installation

2007-11-29T19:35:00.001-07:00

Tonight I installed a temporary handheld GPS bracket on the right side rail just in front of the instrument panel for our Garmin 496. I am thinking of putting an Air Gizmo panel mount in the instrument panel and mounting the 496 there. With it mounted on a RAM ball mount, I can move it if there is glare from the sun on it. If it is permanently mounted in the panel, I will have to live with whatever glare there is.

11/28 Programming Dynons continued...

2007-11-28T19:38:00.001-07:00

Tonight I set in the airspeed set points for Vs0, Vs1, Vfe, Vno, and Vne into the Dynon EFIS-D10a.

Then I taxied the RV-4 to the compass rose on the airport and calibrated the remote magnetometer for the Dynon EFIS. It turned out to be a very easy procedure. I lined the RV-4 up pointing magnetic north on the compass rose and started the calibration program and pressed the north button on the Dynon. Turned the aircraft to face magnetic east and pressed the east button on the Dynon. Turned the aircraft to face magnetic south and pressed the south button. Turned the aircraft to face magnetic west and pressed the west button. The program took about a second to finish the alignment program.

After calibrating the remote magnetometer, I calibrated the fuel tank level sensors for the Dynon EMS. I drained all of the fuel out of both tanks. Then I arranged to have the fuel truck from the local FBO help me calibrate the tanks. Again it was very simple with the Dynons, put it into fuel calibration mode and press the start button. The screen prompts you to add 2 gallons at a time and press the add button.

The sensors didnt change after 14 gallons so I pressed "FULL" to finish up with that tank then repeated the steps for the right tank.
The tanks actually hold 16 gallons in each but the sensors hit the top of the tank before the last gallons can be added because of the tilt in the wing. The picture below shows the fuel levels on each tank with full tanks.

11/26 RV Reassembled.

2007-11-26T20:58:00.002-07:00

The RV-4 was finished assembling this evening. The wheel pants are left off because they are in the process of being refinished.

Below is an image of the instrument panel while the engine was running.
The instrument panel will be removed and painted in the near future.
The Dynon EMS shows the idle at 1040 rpm and the fuel flow at 6.3 gph.
This seems too high an idle and the fuel flow is way to high for idle. Normally it is around 2 gph at idle. The idle was showing about double the RPM until I doubled the Dynon recommended setting for the tach sensor. The fuel flow K factor was at the recommended setting of 30000. I increased the K factor to 36000 and the fuel flow dropped to 4.6 gph at idle. Still too high.

I got the digital handheld tach out to compare the rpm but it evidently doesnt work in the dark.

11/25 Reassembly continues...

2007-11-25T18:46:00.001-07:00

When I was installing the protective white rubber boot over the battery solenoid, I put a little pressure on the terminal I was forcing the rubber boot over. The battery solenoid energized! I found I could energize it by applying up pressure against the terminal from the battery. Definately bad internally. I got a new solenoid from Aerozona Parts but the new solenoid had two small terminals on the front of it instead of one like I had. No problem, you just hook one wire to 12 VDC and one to ground to energize the relay. I hooked the red Vertical power lead to one of the terminals and then ran a line from the other terminal to ground. When I turned on the power, the Vertical Power switch panel gave me a Battery Contactor failure alarm. I disconnected the power lead and applied power directly from the battery and the contactor energized. After a quick call to Marc at Vertical Power, he told me in a polite way that the Vertical power lead supplies ground to the contactor not 12 VDC as it states in the installation manual so I had wired it backwards. :<( This makes sense as you can use the vertical power lead with either the single or dual post battery contactor. I knew this but had forgotten it and felt embarrased that I didnt consult the installation manual again. I was thinking the red lead meant 12 VDC. After wiring the battery solenoid the correct way (run a jumper from the hot batt terminal to one of the small terminals and install the Vertical Power lead on the other terminal), the battery contactor failure alarm went away. It made me more comfortable with the robustness of the VP setup knowing that even though I had installed the wiring backwards, nothing was damaged or messed up. The VP-100 just notified me of the error and once I wired it correctly, everything was ok again. Below is a picture showing the two post battery solenoid. The yellow wire between the two small posts is a diode that helps prolong the life of the solenoid.

I spent a couple of hours this morning going thru the dynon EMS setup menus item by item.
Shown below is the Dynon Install setup menu.

After getting everything mostly programmed, I finished up all of the final little details that needed to be done before the airplane was ready to fly. I had rebuilt the master brake cylinders a couple of weeks ago, but had not added any brake fluid yet. Since the RV-4 brake cylinders are mounted upside down, its a little difficult to get all of the air out of them. I made a pressure bleeder out of a 1/2 gallon pump up sprayer from Ace hardware and some 1/4 tubing.
It took us a long time to get the brakes bled properly. We added the fluid from the bottom of the brake calipers. Next time I am going to try using the pressure bleeder from the top of the master reservoir.
Heres a picture of the Dynon EMS right after first startup. One thing I immediately noticed is that the tach is not working. After thinking about it I realized I had ran a new power lead from VP control unit and had not programmed it yet. So once I profile the power lead correctly in the VP switch panel, the tach should start working. The fuel flow is showing 12.4 gallons an hour. I know that is incorrect for an idle setting so I need to adjust the K factor until the fuel flow is correct.

I also need to drain my fuel from the tanks and then add a gallon at a time while running the Dynon fuel calibration progarm. The picture below shows the fuel screen.

Tomorrow I will work on getting the problems fixed that came up during the startup. One other problem that kept me from flying today is that the Plane Power alternator is not charging so I have to figure out what the problem is with it.

11/24 Reassembly continues.

2007-11-24T20:44:00.001-07:00

I had to make new supports for the two air controls. The old supports were in the subpanel bulkhead that was removed. I made a little triangular bracket to fit against the new sidepanel that will hopefully be out of the way of my long knees.

The Dynon manifold pressure sender installs in the engine compartment. The sender looks like an automotive part. It uses weatherpack connectors.
http://www.weatherpack.com
There are little green rubber seals that go around each wire. You are supposed to use a special weatherpack tool to crimp the connectors, but one of my crimpers did a good job on it. The pins have an extra long connector that wraps around the little green rubber seals. Don't drop them as they disappear. I am still missing one.

Since I am not using the rpm gauge anymore, I don't have to run the long cable from the engine through the firewall to the rpm gauge anymore. However, I need an electrical signal for a source for the Dynon EMS. There are at least two options. Use the wires from the magnetos or install a transducer on the rpm takeoff on the engine. Vans sells a transducer that mounts directly on the rpm takeoff on the engine, but it wouldn't work on mine because of interference from the SD-8 backup alternator. Vans sells a 12 inch extension for it so you can put it in a different location. I got the extension but had a hard time finding a place to mount it as I didn't want to drill more holes in my already cluttered firewall. I ended up attaching it to the engine mount with Adel clamps. I am reconsidering my choice and may change back to driving the Dynon rpm from the magnetos. You have to put a 30K ohm resistor in line with the magneto output to knock the signal down to an acceptable level for the Dynon. This would clean up my engine compartment a little.

The fuel pressure was also mounted on the engine mount. It uses fast on connectors attach the two wires from the Dynon EMS.

Since I had removed the 60 amp circuit breaker (on the instrument panel) for the alternator, I had to replace it. Vertical power shows an ANL fuse that mounts between the alternator and the output side of the battery solenoid. I ordered one from http://www.BandC.biz.
We had replaced our 35 amp externally regulated alternator with a Planepower 60 amp internally regulated alternator. We had left our regulator on the firewall shelf. We figured if we were ever out of town and we lost out alternator and could only get an external unit, we could reuse the regulator to get us home. However, its location looked like a good spot for the ANL fuse so I removed it and added it to the pile of discarded parts.

Here is what the ANL looks like when its connected.

The next step was to hook up the CHT and EGT sensors to the Dynon EMS harness. The Dynon EMS has a 25 pin lower connector (brown wires in picture below) dedicated to just the CHT and EGT sensors. The harness comes prelabled with the function of each sensor so its a simple matter of matching the color coded wires to the same color wire on the sensors, adding a faston connector and plugging it into the sensor wires.

11/20 Remote Magnetometer rewiring

2007-11-20T20:15:00.001-07:00

Tonight after work I squirmed back into the fuselage and took the D sub 9 pin remote magnetometer connector apart. The 2 wires from the outside air temperature (OAT) probe have been put into the wrong holes as I counted from the wrong side. Using the D sub extraction tool, I removed them and reinserted them into the correct holes. Dynon supplied a plastic D sub extraction tool with the wiring harness which I thought wouldnt work as well as my metal ones, but it seemed to work ok. I dont think it would hold up to repeated use though.

Here is what the connector looks like almost reassembled.