RE: Reluctamt Cold Starters

[richard bies <bies@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

No, I have not stood there with a stop-watch.  It seems to me that
references vary as to how long it maintains continuity, under what
conditions.  Long enough to flood the bejeebers out of the system, anyway.

I see no 555 chip, or anywhere a timer could be.  My take is that the
switch is fundamentally thermal, with the flow of current heating the
device until continuity is broken (or conditions otherwise warm the
switch to that point).  I think that at least Bosch <named> it right.

Assuming it works that way, then the ambient temperature is the base from
which the heating begins -- the colder, the longer it will fire.  Which is
pretty much as it should be.  However, everything is brass or aluminum --
any heat generated by the current will be dissipated quickly, and the
"clock" will be re-set.

As soon as a ten + year-old car, or real-world conditions, depart from the
perfect world of the German designer's drawing-board, it will cause
problems.  (The Spica system, as it comes from the factory, is also
capable of flooding so completely that starting becomes a major project
- -- one of the major, major pluses of the manually operated retro-fit 
- -- of course, a non-problem with Webers.)

With the previous generation K-Jetronic, some operators find it is less
trouble day-to-day to simply un-plug the cold-start injector, and grind a
bit longer on start, restoring the connection only when the weather is
cold enough that the car <won't> start without it.

r.m.bies

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