......Ahh-hh-h, the joys of meddling with the elusive spark - a challenge for all who've been stranded when they needed it most. Fortunately, advances in modern solid-state electronic technology has massively increased ignition system reliability to the point that ignition failure is almost unheard of these days. So, if I said to you "electronic ignition...", it is now so familiar that you might rhetorically respond by asking "...you mean transistorised ignition?".
.....Well, guess what? .....for a brief sliver of time when mechanical breaker systems had "peaked" and nascent fully transistorised ignition systems had only begun to creep out of the development labs there was, for a brief blink of an eye the thyratron tube (you know, those fragile glass 'breaky' things!) based ignition system. While there is a fairly good crop of patent literature for the few decades around and mainly after WWII there were only two units ever mass-produced commercially. One, the TUNG-SOL EI-4 marketed by their subsidiary, Motion Control Inc. (by the way I'm intending to write an article on this unit so am looking for one - going, or not - to study and for photography so if anyone has one to donate, I'd be very grateful for any offers. Thanks) and the other, made by BOSCH GmbH and only ever installed in the very limited production run of the NSU Wankel-powered Spyder sports car from the early 1960's. Both suffered from poor reliability and were quickly abandoned.
The latter however, is the more interesting because it turns out to have some interesting 'history' behind it. It seems that Bosch had produced an experimental unit as far back as WWII which they installed in a fighter aircraft. The sentence just written is the sole amount of information I have on the subject and I am eager to learn more - much MORE! Does anyone out there have the full encyclopaedia on it - written technical narrative, photos, circuit diagrams, research reports, etc, etc. what was the fighter aircraft, how did it perform - the whole 9 yards!
....Let us all know.....
.....Well, guess what? .....for a brief sliver of time when mechanical breaker systems had "peaked" and nascent fully transistorised ignition systems had only begun to creep out of the development labs there was, for a brief blink of an eye the thyratron tube (you know, those fragile glass 'breaky' things!) based ignition system. While there is a fairly good crop of patent literature for the few decades around and mainly after WWII there were only two units ever mass-produced commercially. One, the TUNG-SOL EI-4 marketed by their subsidiary, Motion Control Inc. (by the way I'm intending to write an article on this unit so am looking for one - going, or not - to study and for photography so if anyone has one to donate, I'd be very grateful for any offers. Thanks) and the other, made by BOSCH GmbH and only ever installed in the very limited production run of the NSU Wankel-powered Spyder sports car from the early 1960's. Both suffered from poor reliability and were quickly abandoned.
The latter however, is the more interesting because it turns out to have some interesting 'history' behind it. It seems that Bosch had produced an experimental unit as far back as WWII which they installed in a fighter aircraft. The sentence just written is the sole amount of information I have on the subject and I am eager to learn more - much MORE! Does anyone out there have the full encyclopaedia on it - written technical narrative, photos, circuit diagrams, research reports, etc, etc. what was the fighter aircraft, how did it perform - the whole 9 yards!
....Let us all know.....
