Primary, Secondary coil..

mopar04 · Post by **mopar04** » Thu Jan 27, 2011 2:22 pm

Long story short, I'm in school and taking engine performance and we came to the primary and secondary coil (dwell, spark advance, saturation, ect.) and I am lost. I have talked to the teacher about this and have tried to look at it on an oscilliscope out in the lab but still don't understand it. Overall I don't really succeed in anything electrical/electric wise.
So I guess what I'm asking, is there any simpler way to put this?

(I wasn't sure if this should have been posted in electrical thread since it is nothing specific, but I posted it here to be safe.)

Any info would help.

ZeroChad · Post by **ZeroChad** » Fri Jan 28, 2011 1:45 am

Well, the ecu contains coil drivers. These output a pulse waveform. Some call it pulsed DC, but imo it should be called a waveform. The amount of time this waveform is at its peak (width of peak) is referred to as dwell. These drivers send this waveform to the primary coil of the coil pack. Through mutual inductance the primary side induces a higher voltage, lower current waveform in the secondary coil. You can think of it as a transformer. This then creates a spark across your spark plug.

mopar04 · Post by **mopar04** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 5:03 pm

Thanks man, I went back and kinda comprehended what it was saying. I was just reading in my school book that the primary coil becomes saturated and then when when the switch opens it collapses the magnetic field on the primary coil and induces the voltage to the secondary coil creating the spark.

Thanks again

ZeroChad · Post by **ZeroChad** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 5:50 pm

Right! Transformers only work when the current is changing.

Post by **racer12306** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 7:35 pm

OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, now I get it. I so did not understand that you were talking about the primary and secondary windings on a transformer

I r specul

mopar04 · Post by **mopar04** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 2:18 pm

Thanks for the help!