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May, might and could are all words to instill doubt and emotion. I have "never" heard of an actual case of RF causing ignition problems. Sure I have heard static from spark plugs in a speaker, but that is the extent. If there are such cases can some one please reference them. Just like the sign at the construction sight that said "turn off all electronics, blasting ahead", I have never heard of a premature explosions from failure to turn off electronics. Being an American, I like to see explosions and take it as a sign to turn on every radio in my vehicle.
In the marine environment, you've got radios, radars, sounders, AIS transceivers, gensets, GPS, alternators, computers, plotters, inverters, and goddess knows what all else competing for space and what we call an 'operating envelope' in a very small area. If you don't keep all those components in separate envelopes, properly installed, nothing works. If the boat is not properly grounded, nothing works. If the passive interference from trolling wire rubbing against the water isn't properly attenuated, nothing works. A simple mistake like running the vhf antenna wire improperly can put all the navionics on tilt. I just got me a nib Furuno Radar for the RAGING FERRET. It's got an entire section in the manual telling me how far from this and that I need to have the twirley, where the head can be, and how not to route the cabling between them. The warnings clearly state that navionics and compass could, should, would be affected by improper installation.
I can shield the timing sensor cable with a braided sleeve.Will a ferrite bead act as choke enough?
You say the power wires. Just to clarify -- The wires inbound to the converter or outbound to the bulb?
First, if you can't comprehend the question, don't challenge it. I didn't ask about the effect of interference on ignition. I asked about the effect of interference on the ecu.Second, 'might' and 'could' also start 'research' and 'understanding'. It depends on if you're a brain half-full or brain half-empty kinda guy. It's because I haven't heard of it in this environment that I'm asking the question. I'm not a lawyer. I often ask questions I don't already know the answer to. I seem to learn more that way. In my opinion it's a better approach than what's being called here the "American Way" of keying up the CB at an active demo site to see if the blast warnings are true. Do you also pour McDonald's coffee in your lap to see if the "CAUTION: HOT" warning is true?You're asking for references of 'cases' where this has happened. If I knew of any specifically involving the components I listed on a motorcycle, I wouldn't be asking about it here. However, radio and electrical interference is such a universally recognized issue that the FCC has made rules to limit the amount of interference in what they call class A, B, C consumer and industrial devices. There is even an FCC ID database that assigns a unique "serial number" to every electronic component in a piece of equipment, and then to the assembly, so if a part or assembly is found to be in violation of the rules, it can be identified and pulled from the world supply -- or at least blacklisted from the US market.A LOT of equipment, including computers, microwaves, security systems, and even vacuum cleaners, are often still stickered as interference generators. The IEEE and ANSI also contribute rules for residential and industrial/commercial building codes governing the placement of high voltage/low voltage/data cable and equipment. When doing structure planning and cabling/equipment installation I've got more rules to follow than I can keep track of. So they generously supply me with rule books, auditors, and inspectors to school me on my transgressions.In the marine environment, you've got radios, radars, sounders, AIS transceivers, gensets, GPS, alternators, computers, plotters, inverters, and goddess knows what all else competing for space and what we call an 'operating envelope' in a very small area. If you don't keep all those components in separate envelopes, properly installed, nothing works. If the boat is not properly grounded, nothing works. If the passive interference from trolling wire rubbing against the water isn't properly attenuated, nothing works. A simple mistake like running the vhf antenna wire improperly can put all the navionics on tilt. I just got me a nib Furuno Radar for the RAGING FERRET. It's got an entire section in the manual telling me how far from this and that I need to have the twirley, where the head can be, and how not to route the cabling between them. The warnings clearly state that navionics and compass could, should, would be affected by improper installation.My reasoning is that if simple , passive line noise can impact a computer network -- a situation I see frequently -- and from simple things like putting a network router too close to an old-school oil furnace or connecting it to the same circuit as the fluorescent lights -- it seems reasonable that an active noise generator, like a coil or HID converter could do the same on the trike, and possibly from a greater distance. I know that some WG members work at this level in real life, and that some of these same folks have installed noise generators on their bikes and cars. So WG seemed like a good place to ask the question. Wayne's experience may have saved me a crap-ton of grief. And like he says, it's better to find that out during the design stage than on the road test.So thanks, Wayne. :)
No expert in the field of RFI, but seat of the pants experience seems to indicate that on a motorcycle, it is not real important.
I have a similar situation with a LED controller from ADVMonster http://stores.advmonster.com/waterproof-wireless-led-dimmer-with-high-beam-bypass/This unit lets me have the LED Aux. lights on at a predetermined level, and when I turn on the high beam, the LED's go full blast. I've noticed when I use this feature, the AFR jumps up on my V11S from 13.5 to 14.0 or higher and the bike runs too lean (IMO). If I remove the high beam bypass from the circuit, my bike doesn't change AFR whether the LED's are still set at the predetermined level, or I turn the LEDs on at full blast.Here's a quote from a gent on the V11 forum about LED signal:"Think,with your LEDs "on" you have overload on the alternator. Unfortunately most LED-Beams have internal switching power supplies with constant current regulation which produce hard currentspikes in motos electrical system. Your "Module" (it's a pulse width modulation) does the rest. The currentspikes bring your alternator into magnetical saturation and the voltage breaks down in common mode with the spikes. The regulator also can't handle the spikes (10 kHz....1MHz). Would be a good idea buffering the Module primaryly with a diode and an electrolytic with an foil condensator in parallel to damp the pulses.
I also disagree that a 30w LED is overloading an alternator that used to do a 55w halogen. The math goes the other way. The scope readout is vaguely reminiscent of a modified sine wave, such as you'd see in a cheap inverter. The pattern could be modifying the DC waveform, causing the ecu to mis-time or change the duration of the injector pulse. In the marine environment (where I most often see this), it not only affects other devices using the same battery/charging universe, it also affects things like computers and navionics that are directly plugged into it. there is no cure for a high watt inverter other than to replace it with a proper waveforming inverter. The noise we see in the scope print isn't as much as with an inverter, so I'd at least try choking the power lines and giving them good separation (as Wayne already suggested) before getting too excited about the problem. Although it seems silly, a tin foil hat around the noisy wires also reduces bleed.We get awful bleedover from POTS (telephone) cabling when a noisy line is in the same bundle as Cat5 (network cable). We can sometimes run shielded twisted pair to attenuate some of it, but shielding also sucks the signal out of the cat5, so it can only be run short distances.I think there's some good information coming out of this topic, so I'll let it run. The LED interference is something I had not considered, but my LED headlamp is a sealed unit -- nothing but wires come out of it.My project moved past the location decisions last night, so I've picked my poison. I have a small area to put all the stuff into -- the front half of a loop tank. So getting the components 'feet' away from themselves isn't possible. My other issue is airflow in the confined space, so some placement was made with a nod toward cooling the power supplies and ecu. I did manage to get the ecu way up in the front of the electrics bay, and the converters on the back side of the partition that separates the electrics from the glove box, which uses the back portion of the tank.