Megajolt/E- Black Edition

Here we have a minor update to the Megajolt/E ignition controller.  What did we do? Just a few things:

Normalized components

Updated the design to use mostly 0603 parts so we can share components across RaceCapture,  Megajolt/C and other projects.  This will save us a ton of hassle swapping component reels on the pick and place when we switch between building our projects. Yep, we’re lazy.

Stencil Printing

Boy, I wish we would’ve done this sooner. We switched from the CNC dot dispenser to our soon-to-be heavily used stencil printer with spectacular results. We saw incredible improvements in our production quality, starting with the first batch!

TPS parts always installed

The parts for the input circuit for the Throttle Position Sensor (TPS) parts are now always installed, so 5V v-ref on the Molex connector is useful even with a MAP sensor’d version.  Just don’t simultaneously use MAP and TPS or the readings will be off!

Matte Black PCB

We’re also trying out a matte black solder mask on the boards  for the near term.  I actually don’t care for it much- we currently use a ‘No Clean’ solder flux and it does leave some unsightly staining. So, next batch will be gloss black. The initial theory with the black PC boards is that reflow performance improves due to increased heat absorption of the board using the darker color. While I didn’t take any hard measurements, not one board in our recent batch had reflow issues, a case that sometimes popped up with the plain’ol green boards. Yes, I could bump the temperature up on the reflow profile, but I’m going for consistency without creating hot spots. So far, so good, aside from the cosmetic annoyances.

Updated Instructions / Software

On deck are changes to the Wiki / installation instructions and Configuration software.  Although the design is 90% the same, the current installation instructions don’t match reality. Configuration software needs a refresh as well!