Over the past few years, we have run across some teams who, for the goal of attaining maximum power, chose to run without an alternator. We started thinking about that and decided to see if there were ...

The distributor has two jobs: to house a switch that tells the coil when to send a spark, and to send that spark to each individual cylinder in the correct order. The distributor shaft is spun by the ...

Automotive ignitions systems have seen many transitions over the years. Historically, the designs have matured from a magneto to today’s coil-over-spark plug designs. The progression follows the ...

Technology offers a modern approach to resolving life's classic rituals, and to be honest it makes life simpler. Emails have replaced snail mail, texts have replaced talking, and, oddly enough, social ...

The ignition control module is a crucial component of a vehicle's ignition system. It is a control unit responsible for regulating the ignition timing and generating sparks to ignite the fuel-air ...

When you’re trying to learn about older cars, you might as well be signing up for the debate club. Every question, especially when it comes to breaker points, electronic, and multiple spark discharge ...

The demands for better emissions and fuel economy in the mid 1970s necessitated leaner fuel mixtures. These leaner mixtures required greater voltage and more spark to ignite. This challenge led GM ...

Push-button start may be common today, but it wasn't always the dominant way to crank an engine. Push-button start systems and ignition key systems activate the same process in different ways. Do you ...

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F. R. HAIGH has recently compared the relative advantages of magneto and coil ignition used for generating the explosions which occur in motor-car engines (Students' Quart. J. Inst. Elec. Eng., Dec.).

A German startup is developing a potential replacement for spark plugs: microwave pulse ignition. The tech is under development by MWI Micro Wave Ignition AG of Empfingen, Germany, which claims that ...