bob62

My Feedback: (28)

I have gotten ahold of a McDaniels duel on board glow setup, my question, does this unit use a separate battery to run glow plugs or does it work off of the planes battery

Thanks Bob

OldScaleGuy

My Feedback: (2)

You will need a separate battery pack for that one, which is normal for on board glow systems.

JohnBuckner

My Feedback: (1)

Hi Bob Yes its a matter of safety and it not a great idea to power up a system where there is a possibility of excessive dumping of your flight control battery. I have only one airplane with a on board system and the reason is I use this ship for repetitive landing go around's, practicing arrested landings. My setup is the Sullivan and not the Mcdaniels though.

John

bob62

My Feedback: (28)

John, the reason I ask the question is, I got this Mcdaniels in a trade. It as I can see was not complete, I went to their web site and down loaded instruction. In their instruction it states to only use 4.8 volt battery. This is why I ask the question. I see in your picture you are using 4.8 to drive the glow plug. I have hooked the system up on my table and all works with the exception of the glow plug, I have a 1.5 volt battery hooked for the glow drive. I get nothing. The instruction make no mention of what to drive the glow plugs. This setup is for duel engines. Any comment would be appreciated. I have several planes with onboard glow, They are all four stroke Saito, I seem to get a better idle

Thanks Bob

JohnBuckner

My Feedback: (1)

OK , I cannot vouch for any details of the McDaniels system and mine is the Sullivan. Actually both those batteries are the same 6 volt packs (five cell) and are independent one one for the receiver and one for the glow driver.

Now what I suspect is your system is probably similar to mine in many ways and is designed to provide the 1.5 volts from a 4.8 volts pack. If that is what the website said the your system I would bet requires 4.8 volt imput in order to provide the 1.5 v output at the plug. That is only my speculation but is the way my Sullivan system works but with 6 volt batteries.

John

bob62

My Feedback: (28)

You are correct John. I removed the 1.5 and installed a 4.8 battery and know I have a reading. The Molex plug for the glow plug drive only has three pins, 2 black and one red, I would assume that means a ground for each engine and you spilt the red

JohnBuckner

My Feedback: (1)

Thanks I am delighted it helped Bob. I have no idea why the extra conductor to the plug(s) is provided but your explanation sounds plausible to me.

John

pkoury

My Feedback: (7)

Are you putting this on a two cylinder engine or trying to use it on two separate single cylinder engines? I have used these in the past on two cylinder engines the red lead is connected to the crankcase and the black leads connect to the glow plugs. If you are wanting to drive two single cylinder engines you might run into problems with wire lengths causing voltage drop.

bob62

My Feedback: (28)

I am wanting to run it on two Saito 30. I was going to spilt the red and make two grounds and use the two blacks on the plugs

Bob

bob62

My Feedback: (28)

You are correct about voltage drop, on a 4.8 battery the plugs are very hot to the touch but do not glow, but on a 6 volt they glow and it has not hurt the unit running it on 6 volts. If you look at a new Sonic Tronic it states 4.8 or 6 volts

Bob