Megasquirt or similar.

[devlin]

I suppose this partly aimed at Quantime as he has gone down this road. What should I be looking for in setting up a Megasuirt or similar system? I understand the basics of fuel injection but aim to learn alot from going through the exercise of doing a full custom system with the view that a Rotrex can be grafted on down the track. Are there any pitfalls to be wary of? I know it's a broad question and I am not looking for the nitty gritty just some real facts, comments and advice.

[Quan-Time]

crap man.. i missed this thread.. only just found it ! OK.. ill see what i can cover.

Megasquirt.. umm.. how far you wanna go ?

1: you MUST get a new rpm pickup for the 'squirt to work.
2: You have the choice of doing spark AND fuel, or just fuel, or just spark.
3: If you do fuel, you REALLY want to get a wideband O2 (WBO2) sensor.. innovate LC-1 is awesome.. its what i use. Bulky if anything.

You have the choice of 1 or 2 fuel rails. This means you can have one rail squirting at identical times, as much as you need, thru all the rev range, AND a second set of injectors comming in at a specific time / rpm. This is identical to most all production "hyper sports" bikes.. any of the 1000cc Japanese do it. Its mainly for passing very tough emissions. One set of injectors are UNDER sized, but when they start to max out, a 2nd set of injectors supply more fuel.

Another option is have the correct size injector, and have them in a "staggered" pattern. So instead of spraying fuel "together" they are independent and do whatever you want. This is my preferred setup, cos you squirt fuel at the exact right time.

The most IMPORTANT thing is to get the RPM signal sorted. You 100% DONT need to EFI the bike. You can just "monitor" whats going on. But once you have RPM signal, you can start playing with things like spark / coil take over, coolant temp, voltage, etc.. Just to log whats happening.
Ive actually heard of someone use it on a race bike cos it was cheaper than buying a "name" after market datalogger. This thing can do the lot but still allow your normal ECU to do the work if you choose.

[devlin]

Cool. Thanks for that. I had forgotten about this thread and to be honest it's on the back burner at the moment. I may have to get my ankle fused which might mean no gear shifting ability. My idea is to go with a race quick shifter thats operated from the left thumb. Any brands I should look at that would be suitable for that project.

[devlin]

Umm, I was confused, I thought the Quickshift did the shifting as well. I will need to have a system that actuates the the gear lever as well. Might be a full custom job for this set up. I have a few ideas but need to sit down with the bike and a design pad and nut out some of the givens and requirements.

[slow codger]

Thumb lever on the lhs for the rear brake, and swap gear lever over via modification. Heel and toe gear lever!! just a couple of ideas.

Dave E

[devlin]

That idea crossed my mind. Need to investigate the gear lever swap possibilities on the casing. I have a reverse pattern at the moment and I figured I would just need a set up for the down shifts ie. lifting the lever up as I can just push down on the lever for the up shifts. This all depends if they fuse my ankle first. LOL I could even just put a hook on the bottom of my riding boots and just pull the whole leg up.

[Quan-Time]

the "quickshifter" is an electronic sensor. Once you "sense" anything, you can obviously act on it.
Electronic solenoid, plus some nice fly-by-wire would easy do that.. Im currently trying to sort out the FBW, but my time is slightly limited.. More on that later.

You could possibly set up a "rocker" switch much like an indicator switch. but instead of it going and sticking into position, it ALWAYS returns to home. That sends a signal to the ECU (or whatever you build). It then knows to pull the clutch in (via electronic solenoid or some sort of actuator), blip the throttle accordingly while it pushes the gear into position. Once the acknowledgment of gear engagement has been sent, release clutch and return throttle to current position (what your wrist is telling how much throttle you want).
This could be done in.. say..1/5th of a sec.. 0.20sec.. Or there abouts depending on what actuators you have. The "easy" option is to have a simple switch which "pulses" some sort of piston when you hit a button, or pulls it when you do something else. Pull the clutch manually, handle the throttle manually, and do whatever.. That would be HUGELY easy to do.. jsut need to find a place to put the switch really.. even mounting a actuator wouldnt be very hard.

depends what you really want. And that could be done via (DIY) non-megasquirt methods... Simple addon to what you already have.