Anyone dual-plug a V11?

[al_roethlisberger]

Well, I've finally got the new dual-tower coils all installed, hooked up, and the new wires cut and crimped as of tonight(Friday). After a quick test, it looks like they are all 4 firing just fine.

 

So I guess I'll put my exhaust back together tomorrow morning, and hook the tank back up and see if it runs as expected. I don't see why it wouldn't, but you know how these things go

 

I'll let cha know <_>

 

The real test will be a test-ride around the block, then a trip down to Hare Racing next week or so.

 

al

[dlaing]

Alright!

We''ll be looking forward to your report.

Very curious if the map, power, and fuel mileage will change.

You are going to post a before and after dyno chart, right?

I am sure it will be an improvement.

[Mike Stewart]

Well, I've finally got the new dual-tower coils all installed, hooked up, and the new wires cut and crimped as of tonight(Friday). After a quick test, it looks like they are all 4 firing just fine.

 

So I guess I'll put my exhaust back together tomorrow morning, and hook the tank back up and see if it runs as expected. I don't see why it wouldn't, but you know how these things go

 

I'll let cha know <_>

 

The real test will be a test-ride around the block, then a trip down to Hare Racing next week or so.

 

al

Al,

 

It must feel like a different bike with the fork and engine upgrade!

 

Lets go out and ride, now if it was only a little warmer. Yes, it was a chilly 46 degrees F. today in sunny Northern California.

 

Mike

[al_roethlisberger]

Well, all I know is.... it started and ran

 

 

 

It was getting dusk when I finally got the bike back together. ...got the wires installed, Jet-Hot'd exhaust all bolted up, fuel system plumbed...

 

Just in time to take a whole 15 minute shake-down run down to the gas-station, as the fuel light was glowing

 

 

So, with that brief run, all I can confirm is that it appears I didn't break anything (Knocking on wood )

 

I'll write more about the forks in the "hollow axle" thread, but it was too short a ride to tell much about the performance of the engine. I'll be pulling the plugs tomorrow morning to double-check their health, but the bike ran fine as far as I could tell from the brief trip down the block.

 

But so far, I guess I'd call it a "success" But of course I have no way of knowing yet if it's added anything positive or otherwise impacted performance or efficiency. Hopefully I can find out more later when I get it mapped and dyno'd in a week or two.

 

As I know more....

 

al

[al_roethlisberger]

Here's an overhead photo of where the second plugs are, and their cabling...

[al_roethlisberger]

Here is a shot of the dual-output/tower OEM coils installed on the right side...

[al_roethlisberger]

I pulled all four plugs and they looked very good. The right hand side plugs were a bit more black/sooty than the perfectly coffee toned left ones, but they still looked reasonable. So that's a good sign.

 

It'll be interesting to see how well it all works out after I have the new 3.5bar pressure regulator(that's the small blue cylinder on the right side) installed tomorrow, and can get the bike down to Hare Racing perhaps next week for a new map on the PCIIIusb.

 

al

[Guest brad black]

i've come into this very late from the other forums. i did my sport 1100i a few years ago. there'sa write up at

 

http://www.moto-one.com.au/performance/sport1100.html

 

if i did it now i'd use the twin output coils too, but apart form that it'd be basically the same. i used a chip done by fim, as i am only 3 hours from duane.

 

mine ran 10.5:1 comp, and we found it liked 25 degrees maximum advance. you could go a bit higher, but it did ping occaisoinally. the easiest way to play with ignition advance is to get a fim ultimap dealer to flashload a custom v11 map into your ecu. you can change the spark advance at will at every point on the map.

 

i don't remember the spark map i finally ended up with - it had some more just in the off idle area to make it a bit more responsive there too. altho maybe a bit less higher up would have smoothed it out somewhat - i went form the sport to a Guzzi with hanging tits :-) r1100s, and the low down smoothness of the bm was amazing compared to the sport. i could probably find out. if anyone wants any info, email me thru the moto one site.

 

my bike is now back to single plug i am told, and apparantly runs just fine at that, altho it needed about 15% more fuel to run like it did as a dual plug. so 10.5 comp and 25 degrees max advance abviously works ok.

 

it was very nice as a twin plug, but my main inspiration for that was to run more comp. if i did it again i'd try more, machining the heads another 0.5 - 1mm or so.

 

hope that helps anyone who is curious.

 

brad

[al_roethlisberger]

Interesting update from Mike Rich....

 

He told me today that he should have his Dyno setup and running "soon" and he is very keen to finally get some objective data on his dual-plug setup.

 

Up to this point he's been happy to sell the conversion to people, but he was unable to unequivocally say whether it was ~$300 well-spent or not. Most have assumed that it would increase efficiency, and maybe even power, but there hasn't been much real data to confirm these assumptions on the newer V11 bikes.

 

So, hopefully he'll learn something in the next months, and we'll know whether dual-plugging is really worth it or not.

 

At this point, mine work fine... but I can't tell anything yet regarding mileage(it's been too soon, an not enough riding since the weather went South) or via "seat of the pants". So I can't offer anything other than gee-whiz factor feeback either

 

 

But this is one thing I really like about Mike... Although like any businessman, he is certainly out to "make a buck", he's also very honest and conscientious enough to not encourage his customers' wasting money when there is no benefit. Plus he says he hates trying to weld on Guzzi's very porous head castings

 

I'll check back with him later and see what he learns.

 

His findings would make a fitting closure for this thread

 

al

[dlaing]

I thought you were going to dyno your bike again????

[al_roethlisberger]

I will, but now that we are so close to my case rebuild, I'll probably wait to get the remap(and dyno run) until after my other modifications are done. So that will of course make it impossible to tell what contribution the dual-plugs made.

 

But it depends, I still may.... we'll see if I have time and money. Perhaps something could be gleaned from that run if I do it.

 

 

But more to the point, Mike's dyno work will be specifically aimed at evaluating the modification, so I suspect his data and knowledge will yield more meaningful results.

 

al

[Guest v11jap]

Hi there,

 

Been reading this thread with some interest..

Cause my v11 is in the recall and the cilinderheads are of i go for twin sparking..

Been talking to TLM in holland (round the corner for were i life) and they presented me the whole package... Which included changing the timing on the ECU!

I remeber someone posting something about waiting for the powercommander R version or something and just wanted to share that there are other options for changing timing. People at TLM say for the twin spark to work correctly it is pretty important to change timing. Altough it is possible to get a nice running machine by enriching the mixture there is still a big chance of pinging and of course high fuel consumption.............

 

I am getting it sorted out this week í'll post my experience (don't you just love a good dealer round the corner! made the appointement on friday got the bike in saterday and if all goes well picking it up friday with twin sparked heads and the recall stuff sorted out!)

 

 

Ciao

 

jasper

[Guest v11jap]

O just forgot

 

They twin coils they are putting on the bike are also used by lancia&fiat (italian car brands) might be a cheaper route for obtaining these..

 

And just out of curiousity how did the oil lines of the cilinderheads were adjusted in the american twin sparked heads??

 

again ciao

 

Jasper

[al_roethlisberger]

Hi Jasper,

 

This is very interesting feedback, as my experience talking to TLM in Holland(Martijn) was interestingly in contrast with what they provided for you:

 

1) After asking them several times for clarification, TLM assured me that they sell this "conversion" with absolutely no adjustment to the timing curve on the ECU. It simply wasn't required is what they reiterated. Although it was agreed that there was certainly some advantage to getting the timing curve adjusted accordingly if possible/available. The problem was that in most cases, shops didn't have the ability to do so either via a lack of ECU software, or experience or a dyno to optimize the new ignition map.

 

The only folks I could find in the USA are in Michigan I think, that have the experience and software to move the ignition map.

 

2) TLM sold me the same OEM coils as installed on our bikes, except that they are dual-output. Mine are a mixed pair, but one is clearly marked "Champion". I wonder if these are the same Lancia/Fiat coils you reference? It may be hard to tell from the photo below, but the coils I purchased from TLM are exactly the same as our stock units, harness hookup and all(so it's just plug/play), other than having dual-outputs. Can you look at yours and see if these Lancia/Fiat coils are the same? I'd be very curious.

 

 

In regard to the location of the oil supply, if you scroll up and a bit and look at the overhead photo I posted, you can see where Mike Rich has relocated the oil fee to the rear of the head quite neatly. It is very good work.

 

 

Here's an interesting question, I wonder if I shipped my ECU to TLM if they could change the ignition to the optimized map for dual-plugging? I'll drop them an email, but could you ask as an aside the next time you speak with them?

 

thx!

al

[Guest v11jap]

Hi al,

 

No problem i will check for you with TLM.

I think the timing adjustment is pretty new when i talked about it a couple of months ago they didn't mention it to me. The mecanic (called Ben) told me that adjusting the timing is a good thing to do even in standard engine's cause that's the reason why a lott of the bikes are pinging anyway (nice idea for a recall?).. usually "fixed" by enriching the fuelmixture which also helps in understanding why my 92 hp v11 has worse fuel consumption than my friends suzuki tl1000 r with something like 120 hp....

With the twin spark setup this would be a bit better but still i think fuel consuption should be something close to 1l per 18-20 km (don't no miles to gallon but about what the aussie guy is saying)

 

 

Costs for the whole opperation is about 225 euro which is equal to something like 250 dollar? Just checked at the TLM site (couldn't stand it ) and there first mentioning the ECU timing changing in there newsletterl (in dutch) october 2003..

 

Ciao

 

jasper