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Thread: DIY LTCC or similar system for LT1s

  1. #376
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    Been working through a crash course in Blender 2.79 since last post. Hope to have a case design ready this weekend. Does anyone have a 3d printer they'd be willing to put in service? I've been wanting to buy a cheap Kossel type kit for several years but haven't had the funds. I could probably swing it now, but it would put me a few weeks behind with getting my cylinder head fixed.

    What I think will work out is to make the case lid a piece of cut lexan that seals against a perimeter o-ring, a groove for which will be printed in the case. That is provided I can find an o-ring of the necessary size. To seal the wiring penetrations I was thinking of printing dimples in the case as drill locators, and the builder can drill as many holes as needed for their application. The holes will need to fit relatively tight to the wire insulation, and then can be sealed with a two part silicone. I'll try to illustrate graphically as soon as I can get the 3d model functional.

    I believe the case may need to be epoxy coated for waterproofing and to smooth out printing granularity around the o-ring groove. I'd be grateful to hear any feedback from someone with actual 3d printing experience.

  2. #377
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    Sorry for the late reply, I think I have my rostock max calibrated and upgraded now. That's what I've been doing when I found the post. It's a pretty big printer, so draft away. Just need the file in .STL format. By the way the free emachineshop.com software can export to this format as well. Blender is a monster that can do about anything, though.

    I have a spool of white ABS set up. I was trying the popular PLA plastic, and was constantly having jams due to the filament extruder type that mine (like the mini-kossel) has. I now hate PLA plastic and went back to ABS, but now they offer a iron powder-PLA composite. One can print reluctor wheels, but in the end, it would decompose because PLA sucks. Wish they would mix iron with ABS, so we can make things with staying power. I recommend a delta-type printer only if you use abs plastic. The standard x-y cartisian printers with the extruder right there in the moving head can do PLA without jams.
    Last edited by vilefly; 08-25-2018 at 05:18 AM.

  3. #378
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    Thanks for the info.

    After a week of silence I lost patience and pulled the trigger on the mini kossel kit I'd been eyeing. I took the large box of parts with me on vacation last week and accomplished as much assembly as I could without experiencing the wrath of my wife.

    Some of the design flaws I've encountered are staggering. The printed extruder mount "hardware" is probably the pinnacle of this stupidity. Let's mount something capable of melting plastic into a plastic that we printed with the same extruder hardware. That sounds like a good idea? And kapton tape is a suitable way to "mount" an ntc thermistor to a flat surface we want to monitor the temperature of closely.

    If I can make it fit, I have some stainless thermocouple wire braid I'm planning to use to reinforce the teflon extruder tubing.

    Once I have time to finish the incompletely milled parts and re-engineer the obscenely inadequate to make the machine functional I'll report back. I have two spools of "aluminum-look" BPA that I'm hoping will work suitably. I'm hoping there aren't a wealth of other pitfalls to discover in relation to how to print large flat bottom boxes without experiencing warpage.

  4. #379
    Fuel Injected! vilefly's Avatar
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    Well, damn. I should have posted something while I was upgrading my rostock max 3 weeks ago. All this headache could have been avoided. I got mine from www.seemecnc.com . Perhaps some olgling at their designs might give you a few ideas. Mine was version 1.0 in kit form. Set me back around $1000 bucks at the time 5 yrs ago. They are now up to version 3.2 with autoleveling and other junk, and I am struggling to keep up. Manual calibration can be tedious, but it becomes routine with time.

    I am debating on creating my evil 352 engine. Basically, a .030" over 400 small block with a 327 large journal forged crank in place with bearing spacers (or extra thick bearings). It is the engine I've always wanted to build that suits me. Smokey Yunick had sworn by this engine where there are displacement limits racing. I am still on the ropes about deciding, though. I know the LT-1 intake would do nice things for it, heh.

  5. #380
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by vilefly View Post
    Well, damn. ... All this headache could have been avoided.
    Maybe, maybe not. I've wanted to own a 3d printer for at least 5 years but had too many projects draining my "toy" budget. This was a bit of a stretch after I just got back in the black at ~$400, but the need to build a case gave me the excuse I needed to commit the funds. Not to mention it will "pay for itself" by allowing me to print cases for all the other idiotic microcontroller projects my overactive imagination has plagued me with. Wifi thermostats (esp8266), a gps + accelerometer based datalogger / performance computer (also 8266 based), the list of unfinished projects is a mile long. Instead of working on the 3d printer in my garage (where it's hotter than satan's taint tonight), I'm sitting inside soaking up the a/c while working on the datalogger. I'm hoping the end result will be a handheld dyno you can suction cup to your windshield.

    Quote Originally Posted by vilefly View Post
    I am debating on creating my evil 352 engine. ... It is the engine I've always wanted to build that suits me. Smokey Yunick had sworn by this engine
    Sounds interesting. If I were a religious man, Smokey would be my original prophet i.e. Christianity's Moses. Another one of my prophets taught me what I'm starting to think may be the first and most important commandment: "there is no replacement for displacement". If I live long enough to see it happen, my next major "revision" to this project car will be a 383 stroker kit.

  6. #381
    Carb and Points!
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    Hi
    I just finished scrapping a 94 Buick road master. It had a reman ac delco optispark. The opti disk is 10475417.The opti sensor is a J520. The cap shows some wear signs and would need new orings on spindle. I also lost one screw of cover. The parts opti sensor and opti disk appear to be in very good shape. I know this is an old post but I’m looking for a GEN1 optispark. I can send pictures if anyone is interested
    Thanks
    Al
    Last edited by ald; 09-12-2018 at 01:09 AM.

  7. #382
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    Well it's been a while since I've updated you on progress since there hasn't been much due to life happening.

    So with all the high priority items scratched off my "life" todo list, I was able to spend most of the last two weeks finishing the 3d printer kit in hopes of printing a case. Dozens of hours spent (wasted it seems) getting the latest Marlin firmware working correctly, engineering a better extruder mount, troubleshooting the cheap chinese crap parts with keyed IDC headers installed backwards, etc. I finally get to the point of making a test print of some brackets to hold the LCD controller to the printer. I excitedly turn on the heaters and bring it up to temperature for the third or fourth time since completing the build and within a minute I'm greeted by the smell of the magic smoke escaping from the bed heater FET.

    On top of this mishap, after going through my noisy cylinder head for a second time and eliminating anything in the valvetrain that could possibly have been making noise, I'm beginning to wonder if the remaining high-pitched metallic noise I'm hearing may be a cracked #6 piston.

    So I think going forward I'm going to scratch worrying about a case off my list for the next year or two. If anyone wants to take what I've been able to cobble together in blender and complete it, be my guest.

    From here I believe I'm going to cut my goals back on the project and focus on the following in no particular order.

    1) wiring up one of the pcbs to test (I'd been hoping to wait until I had a "permanent" case before doing this)
    2) finish troubleshooting and optimizing the firmware so dwell becomes an interrupt triggered event, etc.
    3) yank the engine back out and pull the pistons to locate the carnage

    When I'm able to confirm and test the pcb design, I'll PM anyone who contributed offering the opportunity to reserve a complete pcb kit (postage included) for the asking. Complete meaning everything needed to assemble a working board. You will have to supply the wire, external connectors, solder work, case, etc.
    Attached Files Attached Files

  8. #383
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    I've finally been able to test the PCB in production and it starts and runs just like the prototype board! I'm extremely excited since this was my crash course in eagle cad. Totally expected at least one circuit network to be misplaced, but happy to report no such difficulties thus far. Barring any obvious design flaws the only remaining items to tackle are firmware related. PMs have been sent.

    In working through this latest step in the process I've come to realize that building a wiring harness is a highly time consuming venture. So much so it made me revisit my post pontificating how the commercial LTCC product is not such a bad deal. The hour(S) I've recently spent crimping and assembling water resistant connectors for 22 leads (44 connections total) to test the initial PCB production example has been extremely non-trivial.

    That said, this is the perfect DIY project for those who are so inclined. I'm thinking I'll publish a parts list (i.e. for digi-key) and potentially sell the PCBs at cost plus postage and a small handling fee for those who don't want to order 10 boards at a time and wait a month for them. By my math the parts expenditure for the current build is around $13 US per completed circuit board. If the number of hours required for assembly were counted this entire enterprise would probably be chalked up as an exercise in futility, but we're neither here nor there.

    I wish I had a better enclosure / case solution for you. In fact I was hoping to have a complete solution minus coils, coil connectors and installation ready to go. But life has prevailed and I find that I've got bigger fish to fry at this point in time since I'm looking at yanking my engine back out (will be the 4th time in 3 years) to figure out my mechanical noise.

    I hope to have some firmware updates soon.

  9. #384
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    You have kepe me interested, I may be interested in one of your offers.

  10. #385
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    HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY! Congratulations on your success (in spite of lots of obstacles thrown in your way)!

    So what makes you think the #6 piston is cracked? Unplug an injector or coil, and it went silent?

    Looks like you need to run a RAMBo board in the 3d printer. It's what runs mine. But they are not cheap, yet robustly protected.
    OCTOPRINT firmware for the raspberry pi can make it wirelessly managed on the home network.
    Last edited by vilefly; 11-02-2018 at 05:55 AM. Reason: fixing misinformation

  11. #386
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by vilefly View Post
    So what makes you think the #6 piston is cracked? Unplug an injector or coil, and it went silent?
    I'm just going by what my stethoscope is telling me, but thanks for the idea. I'll try disabling #6 in eehack tomorrow.

    It's a strange noise that was hard to pinpoint before I yanked the head back off and looked it over carefully. Turns out one of my el-cheapo hardened guideplates wasn't so hard and the pushrod had for lack of a better term sawed a notch in the #2 exhaust guide slot. So it was making some high pitched valvetrain noise when it reached full open that made me think I had multiple valves making noise. I just wish I'd have noticed it before pulling the head off in-car.

    Now that it's just the one noise it's easier to hear clearly. Sort of a high pitched type of piston slap that starts up after a few minutes of running.

    I hope to yank it out before turkey day and pull the slugs to find out if I'm right or wrong. But more importantly this gives me the excuse I need to go to a stroker kit that I've wanted to build for a while but lacked the funds.

    Quote Originally Posted by vilefly View Post
    Looks like you need to run a RAMBo board in the 3d printer. It's what runs mine. But they are not cheap, yet robustly protected. OCTOPRINT firmware for the raspberry pi can make it wirelessly managed on the home network.
    I'm not too worried about using my printer at the moment. I stuck it in a corner and haven't looked at it since but it could be the jb weld I used to affix the thermocouple ate into the bed heater traces and shorted. No telling. That project can wait. LOL, @ your raspi comment. I have enough embedded linux boards lying around to make half of the household appliances network enabled. Actually almost half are. But I prefer wired ethernet to keep the 2.4g noise floor to a minimum.

    Anyway back to topic - I've spent most of the last several days working on a major rewrite that cleans up a lot of cruft that'd been hanging around since the proof of concept phase. The routines looking up dwell and managing when to energize the coils have been completely rebuilt and I believe are quite a bit more efficiently handled. So much so it may afford enough overhead to allow for cell smoothing / interpolation. I have a few obstacles I'd like to conquer before updating it on github. One such goal is removing the need for monitoring the falling edge on the low res signal after sequence is detected. So look for an update in a few days once I get to drive and test. The last test drive back in September was somewhat disappointing due to some intermittent stumbling. I'm hoping that's resolved now but it might not be, or it might turn out that it's completely unrelated to the ignition system. Unfortunately I chopped my harness up enough it would be a solid weekend project to go back to the distributor.

    I'm also hoping to get time over the weekend to write up a quick assembly how-to for those receiving the sample kits.

  12. #387
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    Version 0.9.13 uploaded to github (link in sig). This version has NOT been tested extensively. Due to rain today I can't drive it because I've yet to seal the enclosure and don't want to risk water infiltration. Yesterday's test drive wasn't great but some small bugs have since been fixed. It felt like some cylinders might have been missing intermittently.

    Major changes:

    1) revised dwellLookup so it returns total # of degrees for dwell requirement in two components - # of cylinders ahead of current, and remaining degrees. Logging reflects this new convention so for example if spark advance is 28 and dwell requirement is 38, dwell will be reported as D0.66. Anything over 89 degrees will be D1.xx and so forth.

    2) #1 was done to simplify the dwellCoils() routine so less math is required

    3) main loop has major cleanup and some prioritization trees so more time critical functions are acted on with higher priority

    4) some ISR cleanups and optimization

    5) removed the low res falling edge toggle code in the ISR after sequence is detected

    6) map sensing for accel comp adder has been improved and tested - optional output #1 on pin A0 is used to mirror the state of accelComp variable for in-car testing and tuning of map threshold

    That's what I can remember offhand anyway. :-) As always smarter coding suggestions are always welcome.

    I'm not going to have a chance to write up a proper assembly guide for several days, but here's a quick stab at what is fresh in my mind.

    Attached is a bill of materials with resistor color codes for those who don't know them offhand. I would cite a few of the phrases I was taught in order to aid memorization, but that was from a much less politically correct era and I'm afraid it would get me banned. :-)

    All values for required components are silk screened on the board. You will probably need a magnifying glass. If there is no value for a resistor or capacitor and only a component number that means the component is optional and will need to be selected based on your particular application for that input or output.

    Obviously, mind the key marking on the Atmega.

    The 5v regulator can be attached to the board with a 1/8" pop rivet or a 3mm x 8mm screw and nut. I don't believe a heat sink will be required but a small sheet metal style one could possibly be used if you'd like to err on the side of caution.

    Due to the size of the component side solder pads, the crystal should probably have a mica insulator to prevent possible shorts. Since I couldn't find anything on short notice I used a business card temporarily between the PCB and the crystal's metal case while soldering to provide a small air gap. Solder these joints without going overboard on the solder and you should be fine.

    The polarization marks on the electrolytic capacitors go in pointing toward each other.

    Resistor values for R1 and R2 should be measured with a known good meter and recorded (ideally on the board). These values can be fed into the source to fine-tune the voltage divider network for the ignition circuit adc formula.

    EDIT3: these values go here
    Code:
    // plug-in your values for R1 and R2 here (voltage divider network)
    // be sure to include mantissa of zero or the precompiler will convert to integers and data will be lost
    #define R1_VAL 9850.0
    #define R2_VAL 3844.0
    The LEDs go in with the short leg (cathode / negative) closest to the board edge. If you happen to cut the legs to the same length you can identify the cathode by looking at the internal mechanics of the LED. On these particular chemistry LEDs the larger piece (generally referred to as the "anvil") is on the cathode / negative side.

    The plating on these boards is pretty thick so try to get everything right the first time. Desoldering attempts haven't worked out very well for me.

    Good luck!

    EDIT1: BTW, after programming be sure to disconnect the serial adapter or if you intend to log the datastream remove the connection for the DTR pin or the controller will be reset by the serial adapter. I use a six pin IDC male to male connector between two female connectors and offset it by one pin as shown in this picture from post # 356. Just keep in mind if your engine stalls immediately upon starting logging you forgot to disconnect the programming pin.

    Also, for programming choose board type "Arduino/Genuino Uno" from the Arduino Tools menu.

    EDIT2: It looks like I might be out of commission for a while now. I've been meaning to get a camera in the #6 and #8 bores for several weeks, and this is what I found on the inboard side of #6 cyl wall.

    Pic (click)

    I think I might have a broken or bent skirt there. Whatever it is, something's not good. Hoping to avoid the boring machine!
    Attached Files Attached Files

  13. #388
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    Sorry for the excessive posting but I parsed the 0.9.13 source with cppcheck and it found an out of bounds error in the est_isr() and a missing address of operator in getDwell(). Fixes are on github as 0.9.14. Also cleaned up some preprocessor warnings about narrowing casts. This build is untested but I will try to test base functionality (starts, runs, etc.) tonight. EDIT: basic functionality tests were good.

    By the way, one added feature in this build that I overlooked in my previous post is the theoretical ability to handle ATDC (aka negative advance) spark timing. I'm not sure how to test this in-vehicle - possibly wait for the next ice storm and go out for a short drive to trip the ABS.

  14. #389
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    Quote Originally Posted by spfautsch View Post

    By the way, one added feature in this build that I overlooked in my previous post is the theoretical ability to handle ATDC (aka negative advance) spark timing. I'm not sure how to test this in-vehicle - possibly wait for the next ice storm and go out for a short drive to trip the ABS.
    Serious question: What does that achieve?
    Mitch
    '95 Z28 M6 -Just the odd mod.
    '80 350 A3 C3 Corvette - recent addition.

  15. #390
    Fuel Injected! spfautsch's Avatar
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    If you're referring to tripping the ABS, it's because kur4o has speculated that might be the only time ATDC timing is commanded by the PCM.

    If your question is more broadly asking what does retarded spark achieve that would be for torque management - i.e. traction control, abs, between gears on a slushbox (auto trans), etc.

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