>G'day Paul
>
>Yesterday I heard the sounds of silence at 8500ft in my RV7. Fortunately
>I have been sticking to open country for the 40 hour test period and was
>able to select a stubble paddock uphill and into wind and made a safe
>landing.
>The two coil packs on the front rotor had failed, melted plastic near the
>connectors. When the front rotor failed I was able to continue at 80
>knots for about ten minutes until the ignition circuit breaker popped.
>The coil packs failed unsafe (shorted).
>When the rescue crew arrived I rewired the two good coils to the
>trailing plugs and flew the twenty miles home.
>That makes four Mazda failed Mazda coil packs. The first two came with
>the engine.
>I am going to remove the tangential muffler as it is a huge heat source
>even with heaps of shielding, and try a 3 into one pipe system with no
>muffler as there is a 4 seat Jabiru flying in Sydney (with the Renesis
>>from a Cobra that crashed in Queensland) that apparently is reasonably >quiet.
>
>Regards Ian Beadle
>
>Wow! Ian you live a charmed life. Very sorry to hear that.
>Very glad you made a safe landing. Stock RX8 coils I assume.
>Do you have a picture where they were mounted?
>
>Perhaps they are not up to continuous RPM. Have you measured the current?
>Perhaps a few low ohm power resistors are called for. What ignition
>system are you using? How wide is the pulse?
>
>As far as I know the GM V8 coils have given no trouble.
>
>
>Tell me more about the RX8 engine powered Cobra that crashed in
>Queensland. Why did it crash? Does Baz know about this?
>
>Paul Lamar ...No rotor no motor.


Ian,

At the risk of jamming up the message board with non-technical
stuff--congratulations on getting through this one unscathed.  There are a
lot of us who are years behind the folks ont he forefront like yourself,
and
we appreciate the hard-won knowledge that we'll have a result of your work
(and gutsiness).

Mark Waldron

Ian,

Tracy Crook mentioned in his conversion guide he experienced a failure with
the stock coil modules, which found out to be a failure of the ballast resistor.
Don't know if it is the same problem. Tracy suggested to replace it with a
0.35 - 0.4 OHM 20 Watt resistor.

Regards
Thomas

That was the old 2nd gen ign system.