some Tiny-Tach pictures

[Vincent Waldon]

Another great idea.

In fact... VW thoughtfully providing a couple of raised lugs on the flywheel specifically to trigger a Hall-effect transducer inserted in the timing hole.

The lugs are on either side of TDC iirc so a little bit of math would be involved, but hey, that's what computers are good at.  Or perhaps just physically offsetting the sensor would do it.

I'll build my interface to be 5V compatible... then you can use it as an input to a serial or printer port on your computer.  Hall effect transducer to detect the flywheel lugs should be pretty straightforward as well... got some generic real-time graphing software in mind ??!!

[lord_verminaard]

Hmmmm.... they might.  It will need to be a 4X multiplier rather than a 12X divider but ya never know.

Having said that, if they do have something it will probably be the better part of 100 bucks or so.   I'm gonna restrict myself to parts found at your friendly neighborhood Radio Shack / The Source since they are pretty ubiquitous,  and see if I can do it for 10.

Yeah, I like your idea better.  

Brendan

[diesel smoke]

If you want a good place for electronics go to Active Electronics, there in Edmonton. 6029-103rd St.(Gateway Blvd) 438-0644  

Excellent call dude... one of my shrines actually... along with Princess Auto and Lee Valley Tools.  One of those stores you walk into and want to say "I'll take one of everything my good man".  :wink:

However, not everyone has an Active Electronics in their neighborhood so I'll try to stick to parts from Radio Shack.... make 'em easier to source for the wide assortment of diesel folks out there ??!

All those are my shrines too. :lol: I'll walk in there and start drooling all over all the nice widgets and doodads... You're right, not everyone has an Active Electronics...

[TedV]

digikey.com and newark.com are 2 online electronics warehouses, can find almost anything you need in electronics.  Think they have a minimum order amout, like under $25 they charge you $5.  Just buy more stuff.  Might be a pain to do some searching and reading of data sheets but in my experience better than "Radio shack, you've got questions, we've got cell phnes."  :lol:  

Kind of wish I saw the transducer for fuel line before I ordered all the parts to make the opto sensor to schmidt trigger tach signal generator (schematics at 4crawler.com)

[zukgod1]

So is someone going to make an adapter for a regular timing light to sell?

I think this would rock personally.