Project '71 ('73?) CL350... fuel injection and electronic spark control?

[Mr. Vintage]

Nice work, very cool.

[toplessFC3Sman]

Just a teaser; today's been a long day

[Mr. Vintage]

[toplessFC3Sman]

Ok, a bit more explanation, now that I've got a minute. The MegaSquirt engine controller is just about finished being assembled; its sitting in the lower left of the picture, right by the soldering iron. It just needs a couple modifications for the coil drivers, and then the wiring harness made up. I have the main harness from a CBR F4i, as well as the coils, injectors and charging hardware from that bike, so it will serve as the basis for the wiring harness, with the specific connections for CL-specific components such as the brake switches, lights etc being added on to it. The harness should be pretty straightforward to put together, just requiring a bit of time and planning. Its the tuning that'll be interesting.

Also, in the upper middle of that picture is the new alternator end-cap. That thing took a number of hours to whittle down from a solid cyl of aluminum, but it positions the stator windings right in the middle of the magnetic rotor. That was the last major bit of machining to do on the bike (at least for this project). The alternator should be ready to go, and once I get the wiring harness and everything closer to completion, I can put some oil in, crank it over with the starter, and check for any contact and for voltage output. I'll take some better pictures when I take it apart to properly seal it up later this week.

In other news, it should, hopefully, be getting warm enough to start working on the frame out on the balcony again, to start removing the rust, cleaning up the chrome and painting, as well as chemically stripping/de-rusting the tank and resealing it. I bought the POR-15 cycle tank kit a few days ago in preparation.

Its coming along... slowly, but its going

[tolowintoledo]

wow. this is crazy

[ottomymind]

im really enjoying the research and development of this engine. i can easily follow the logic but the technical data...well i use an eyeball not a caliper kinda speaks for itself. cant wait to see your progress. keep it going!!!!

[toplessFC3Sman]

Been a while, with moving, a new job and other commitments, finding time has been difficult. Anyhow...

Ordered the coolant head temp and intake air temp sensors, as well as the fuel pump, but the next big step is the wiring harness. In order to do that though, I need to get the engine back in the bike, which means I gotta speed up my resto-work (aka, nowhere near as intense as an actual restoration, just sprucing/rust removal and repainting) on the frame and running gear.

The tank has been sealed with the POR15 kit, and it looks like all is good for that. I've received all the bits I need to finish up the fuel injection and spark, its just a matter of wiring it up now.

I also got the frame painted this weekend, so its just about time for re-assembly. Not a fancy or professional job by any means, but enough to shine her up and take care of the surface rust.





In addition, to create a place to mount the head temperature sensor, I needed to block off a little bit of area to drill into. I blocked off a little area between two fins between the intake ports, since its more shielded from airflow and therefore the signal shouldn't drift with speed too much. I then filled the blocked off area with JB Weld, and am waiting for it to dry to file down, drill and tap for the sensor.




I've also measured the resistance of the cyl head temp sensor and the intake air sensor at freezing, boiling, and room temp. That way I have the curves for turning the resistance into a temperature that the ECU can use.

A little more painting and shining up, putting the new tubes and tires on the wheels, and then its time for wiring and re-assembly!

[roasterx]

Great to see you working on this again! The job you are doing is stellar. Thanks for the read.

[concours]

Wow. You have a lot of skill and patience. I hope it is satisfying work, rewarding and engaging. Not to be a buzzkill here, but I humbly feel that engine will never run as well as it did with the original (pre-storage induced gunked up) carburetors. I hope I'm wrong and it works out for you.

[Mr. Vintage]

Originally Posted by concours

Wow. You have a lot of skill and patience. I hope it is satisfying work, rewarding and engaging. Not to be a buzzkill here, but I humbly feel that engine will never run as well as it did with the original (pre-storage induced gunked up) carburetors. I hope I'm wrong and it works out for you.

I never was satisfied with the way my diaphram-carbed 350 worked, so I hold out hope for modern electronics and topless' fab skills. Besides, if you learn something, who cares if it works any better?

Great to see an update!

[toplessFC3Sman]

It may not run as well after I'm done, it may run better, or I may eventually just need to buy a new stator cover and carbs and put it back to stock... who knows? I knew it wouldn't be anywhere near as cheap or easy to make it fuel injected, but thats missing the point a little. At least on vehicles, I have a hard time leaving "good enough" alone when it comes to performance (rust on the other hand I just despise dealing with). I know it likely won't increase power, but hopefully there will be gains in rideability and efficiency.

Anyhow, I'm taking the motorcycle safety class this weekend with my gf (i've had my license for close to a year and recently got her a 50cc scooter for getting around town), so that'll keep motivation up too!

[Lesharoturbo]

Fuel injection is, by far, a more efficient and accurate method of delivering fuel. That being said, both carb and injection is just a guessing game at engine fuel requirements. Electronic injection monitor more parameters and can therefore deliver more precisely metered fuel at all throttle positions. This is something that a carb can never do. Every carb has some area in the throttle position where it is not providing the optimum amount of fuel. Most carbs have several such areas.

Diesel engines have been using mechanical injection since inception. Electronic injection is more easily controlled than mechanical injection.

A TU250 fuel injected single today is more efficient and more powerful than my 1981 KZ400 twin i had 20 years ago.

Topless, I think your system will be all you hoped for and more.

NOW BACK TO WORK!!!!!!

Bernie

[ctfz1]

Kickstarting a 325 cc twin, if I remember displacement correctly, shouldn't be a problem.
Wouldn't it have been easier to replace the starter with an alternator?
Do not know the effort involved or sizes.
Seems I remember some starter /generators from once upon a time too.
OTOH this kind of make it work engineering is all too rare now, especially parts bin specials.
Often wondered if carbs off more modern bike would change things.
Can't wait for your runtime tales.

[markjenn]

Originally Posted by Lesharoturbo

Fuel injection is, by far, a more efficient and accurate method of delivering fuel....

All true, but the superiority of FI will be evident only with a properly sorted system and very accurate fuel map, something that will be extraordinarily difficult to do on a one-off basis, especially if you don't have a dyno and some way to monitor the FA ratio. I wish this guy the best of luck, but as the resident curmudgeon in projects like this, he will be exceedingly lucky to every get it to the point where it runs well enough to be driveable, let alone runs as well as the stock carb'ed bike. But I wish him well and as a tinkering/learning project, this is cool as hell.

- Mark

[toplessFC3Sman]

Replacing the starter with an alternator is an interesting idea, however there isn't the space without a longer chain for any normal car alternator, since they're much larger in diameter than the starter. To get clearance, I'd still need to heavily modify the stator cover, and pull the stock magnetic rotor off to disable or replace the one-way clutch from the starter with a solid piece.

As far as tuning, once I get it running, I am confident that I can get it tuned well. I've tuned a CBR600 F4i and a turbocharged rotary engine using this same engine management unit, and primarily from datalogs (so basically getting something close, riding with my laptop recording data in a side-bag or backpack, stopping and examining the data, changing the fuel and spark maps, and trying again). The biggest worry I have right now on that front is noise on the cam sensor from the spark plug right there, which may necessitate moving the pick-up elsewhere. I won't know about that til I try it though. Plus, I will have a way of monitoring the air-fuel ratio. Narrow-band sensors are very cheap and the ECU accepts their input (and can run closed-loop based on it, and correct the fuel tables in the same way), and for initial tuning I can use the LC-1 wideband O2 sensor from the aforementioned turbocharged rotary. I don't think the tuning portion anyway will be relying on much luck.