Tuesday 19 July 2011

I started washing out the run tanks today. I first washed the nitrous tanks twice with water to see how much oil there was in there. There was not too much, but a definite layer on top of the water that came out. The second time there was much less. I then washed them out with detergent three times before the power supply i was using to power everything died. I got a bit wet the first few times opening the wrong valves when there was water in the tanks and having it spray out at me under high pressure. One problem I had was that the solenoids would get very hot after a minute of continuous operation. Turns out they are not designed to operate continuously and draw allot of current, 8A to be exact. This is only of concern for the main pressurisation solenoid as the other two will not be operating for long periods of time. I may have to pulse it to avoid overheating it. I had also been having a problem with the batteries in the relay box not having enough current. Today i found out that when charging one would get quite warmer than the other. It was also the one that was upright (other one was horizontal). I was under the impression that sealed lead acid batteries could be used in any orientation, and that is true but the batteries I have are not sealed despite their appearance. I think they are "imitation" SLA's as they have this plastic plate glued over the acid wells. I am not really sure what to do. New batteries will take too long and i am not sure that they will have a large enough capacity after finding out how much the solenoids draw. I think i might go to some auto electrical places tomorrow and ask if they have any old car batteries. The other annoyance is that with the power supply that died today i only have a small 2A supply with which to charge the batteries with that low current it takes much longer. I am now fairly happy with the plumbing so i should be able to test the injectors after I sort out the battery issues.




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