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I live in Florida, and all summer/fall my Jabiru would start with no problem. Now that the temps are dropping into the 50's at night I'm having a devil of a time getting it started. I did notice this morning that it was turning over slower than usual initially (battery is always on a trickle charger). After it starts it restarts easily, so I'm pretty sure its not an AeroCarb problem. Tomorrow I will pull the cowl and check spark plugs, Mag spacing, etc.

I searched the archives both here and on the Jabiru user sites, and read positive things about the "Jabiru Cold Start Kit". Anyone know where I could find one in the US?

Hi ben,
Try jabiru at Arion aircraft, the usa jab distributer.
Also rotec makes a ‘electronic’ ignition hotter spark kit.

WaiexN143NM
Michael.

Ben,

At temps below 50 it's amazing how effective a bit of pre-heat is in making the engine easy to start. I use a plug-in space heater and some dryer duct stuffed into the exhaust outlet or oil cooler inlet, then cover the cowl with a moving blanket. 20 minutes works well in the 50's, and up to about an hour when it's hovering around freezing.

http://sonex604.com/preheater.html

Jeff

Check clean the plugs . I would be surprised if temps in the 50s would make that huge a difference all by itself. Im betting weak battery or fouled plugs. I put a block heater on mine and with over night temps in the 30 s and when i get to the hanger temps in 40s i can get oil temps up to about 75 while i do a pre flight (30 min) . If over night it is 50 i may or may not preheat but never really had a hard time starting .How old is the battery? Any chance it was toasted or built a memory up being on the charger all the time?

I’ll second what Michael says about the Rotec electronic ignition. John Gillis and I have 1 installed. Makes a big difference in the start for sure

Mike


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Jabiru engines need to turn over fast to generate a sufficient spark, and the oil thickens with cold weather making for slower cranking. For a nice warm Florida setting, just switching to the iridium plugs with their smaller sharper points helps.

Lithium ion batteries also give stronger kick, but after using one for a couple of years, became increasingly wary of the problems they can cause to Jabiru engines. The starting kick has been blamed by some who should know for breaking flywheel bolts, and the very high current they draw as the recharge can be too much for the standard alternators. The Rotec ignition leaves you with a system dependent on electrical power to stay in the air, In Florida should not need any of these.

Will agree with the pre-heat That plus the iridium plugs and an Odyssey battery works up here in the frozen boonies when temps in hangar are in the 20s.

David A.

If your battery is cranking the engine fast enough to start, then I believe the preheat is very helpful in getting it to fire. I've used a heat gun here in California with good success. But if you don't wish to deal with preheat......after all you live in Florida........given that we don't have chokes, I have found that adjusting the Aeroinjector mixture needle 1/4 or 1/3 of a turn counterclockwise (richer) gives the engine just enough more fuel at idle to fire at the lower temperatures (here 40's). That's been my experience, others may disagree.

Art,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Sonex taildragger #95,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Jabiru 3300 #261

Im in the charlotte NC area, so colder than florida, but experience the same issue with my 3300 Waiex. Thing just won't start if the temp is 50 or below. It doesn't even really like starting when its between 50-60 degrees but will eventually.

I found that leaving a mechanics light with a 100 watt bulb stuffed up into the cowling ( I was hanging it off the motor mount where the bulb was aimed forward so the heat would rise to under the engine ) and covering the cowling with a couple thick blankets, and leaving this light in there 24/7, that the light alone would keep the engine in the 60's even if the temps fell to the low 40's overnight. Colder then that and I still needed more heating though.

I ended up building a electric pre heater from a 25$ electric space heater and some clothes drier and home A/C venting supplies. I have it plugged into a remote operated power switch. I can open a APP on my phone and turn on the heater while I am still at home and have it running for however long I want before I get to the hangar. Works great. Letting that thing run for a hour, brings the oil temp from the 20-25 degree range, up to 80-90 degrees.

In case anyone is interested in one of the cell phone activated power switchers, the one I bought is called " switcheon " and was about 200$ and included a years worth of free service, then 50$ a year afterwards.

Either Jabiru or Rotec cold start kits, will do the same, and allow the engine to start at much lower RPMs than the 300 or so normally required.

A few years ago a good friend made a home made cold start system for me to try out. It was just an experiment, but it's been flawless and now starts easy every time, it's there to stay. If the battery has enough power to crank the motor at all, it will start.

Its based on and works the same as the jabiru cold start system by winding an additional coil over the existing Honda coil. A 12v inductive pickup is positioned to trigger at top dead center using 3 tacho flags on the flywheel. It then switches an IGBT transistor to switch the coil winding. This additional coil becomes redundant after the start cycle. It just adds a retarded spark to one of the ignitions, but only whilst the start button is being pushed. I am sure with some wiring mods, hand propping could be possible.

During the start there are effectively 3 ignitions operating. Two normal ignitions firing at 23 deg BTDC and the cold start firing at TDC.

Steve
Sonex 892

Here is the latest update. It warmed up here in Florida and my "cold start" problem didn't go away. I had a friend put a volt meter on the battery while I cranked the engine (fuel and mixture off) and the voltage dropped from 13.2 to 7.9. Thinking it might be a battery problem I pulled the battery out of my Goldwing and tried that with even worse results. My battery is an EarthX about 3 years old. The engine pulls through fine, and as I think I mentioned earlier the first few revolutions it cranks very slowly then speeds up some. Thinking my problem might be the starter being weak or drawing excessive current I decided to pull it out for inspection. Attached are two photos of the bronze metal shavings I found between the motor and the gear housing. The pick is pointing towards the shaft that runs in the inner bushing, which is very worn and produced the shavings. The bearing that supports the rear of the armature is a little noisy too. I'm going to attempt to drive out the bushing and replace it to see if that fixes my problem. Will provide updates!