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How many engines have be ruined by a p-mag? How many inflight engine stoppages have been caused by a p-mag?
Thanks,
Michael-
Michael,
You absolutely
DO NOT need an EICommander to fly safely with the P-mags!
Having tracked a number of issues over the years, I believe that with all the updates Emag has made to the P-mags, up to and including the firmware version 40 update, they have licked the last of their issues.
The early P-mags had problems with the trigger magnet falling off. Between that and their software issues, there were a number of lost timing incidents. The magnets are now securely held in place and as far as I know, are holding up well.
As I explained earlier, the version 40 upgrade solves the last of the known software (unexplained) lost timing issues. These typically happened with people running a mixed ignition or using independent ignition switches and turn the engine over with one P-mag powered but grounded. That is the set-up mode and although the average of the manifold pressure is negative, there are high intensity positive pulses in the system that act just like someone blowing on the tube trying to set the timing. So the crank turns, the P-mag gets two positive pulses and resets the timing to some unknown crank angle.
As I mentioned, as soon as we discovered this, we notified Emag, and they had a fix out within a week. That was a year and a half ago and since then they have not introduced any new updates. (We also requested they set the timing for starting to a few degrees after TDC to reduce the chance of a kickback, which they did.)
To answer your questions, "
How many engines have be ruined by a p-mag? How many inflight engine stoppages have been caused by a p-mag?"
That is difficult to answer. Early on, a "Canard Guy" claimed the P-mag destroyed his engine; however, he installed the P-mags after his engine had chewed up his standard mag's. When I read his comments, it sounded to me like he had an issue, unrelated to the P-mags and was trying to get Emag to buy him a new engine.
Also, the P-mags have gone through a number of hardware and firmware updates over the years. So while there were some issues, I am unaware of any that truly caused an inflight engine stoppage or damage.
As far as I know, there has not been a single lost timing issue with version 40. The number of 113 P-mags flying without the hardware and software upgrades is unknown to me. Maybe the Emag guys can tell you.
I now have 700 hours behind P-mags and have had two issues. On my second flight, running early 113's, I lost the timing on one and saw my CHT's climb significantly higher than I would like on climb out. I was able to throttle back and land safely. (That was the genesis of the EICommander.) The P-mags were sent in for a software update and the problem never reoccurred. (My wiring is different than recommended.) Had I known about the timing issues then, I could have cycled my P-mags, one at a time, and isolated the bad ignition in flight and saved myself a lot of angst!
When Emag announced the fix for the magnet retention, I immediately sent them both in for the upgrade.
When I changed my engine, I bought the 114 boards and installed them in both P-mags. (I have 113 bodies with 114 electronics. We needed to be able to test the EIC with the new boards.)
At 500.2 hours, the internal generator on one of my P-mags died. The ignition never skipped a beat and the only way I knew there was an issue was during my pre-flight, where I drop the power to the P-mags, one at a time, and the engine died. I think I might be the only one who had that issue and I attribute it to the catastrophic prop strike that caused me to change the engine.
Back to your concern, as long as you have all the hardware updates (114's include all these updates), are running the correct timing and have installed and timed the P-mag correctly, you should not have an issue.
Feel free to send me your number, if you want to talk off line about the P-mag.