Rooster Booster ?

[RSMike]

No Rob , not another spammer , there really is a "points assisted electronic ignition system" named Rooster Booster, maybe some of you have heard of this before?
http://www.roosterignitions.com/

I read a write up on a fitting to a R80/7 here:
http://www.realclassic.co.uk/bmwr8009080500.html

And thought it sounded interesting and a relatively easy/cost effective way to stop points pitting, kind of a halfway house between points and full electronic ignition.

Any one heard of this, tried it,  know of similar products, or have an opinion?

[Barry]

Anyone still running stock points should consider one. I built an ignition amplifier from a kit a couple of years back. It's been completely trouble free.

http://www.bmwr65.org/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1244925188/0#0

For me the advantages were:-

My kit cost £10 so it was very cheap compared to the other aftermarket electronic ignitions.

The satisfaction of building something that has worked well.

There was an improvement in spark energy although it's never going to be as good as the expensive systems unless the coils are also replaced.

In the case of failure reversion to the stock points system can be done in a few minutes at the side of the road. With a bit of thought all the original cable terminations can be retained when fitting the kit so it just a case of moving a few spade connections and refitting the condensor. I carry a little kit the size of a match box that contains a condenser and all the tools I need to do the job.


If anyone is going to fit a Rooster Booster or points amplifier of any type
to a 78 -80 bike there is just one extra thing you will need. The spade termination for the points at the bean can is part of the condensor which must not remain connected in circuit so you will need to modify an old condenser by cutting the wire or make up a new insulated spade termination and clamp assembly from scratch which is what I did.  

[RSMike]

Thanks Barry, given the pitting on my points when I changed them out a while back, I am tempted to give the Rooster a try.

May come back for your guidance on the wiring, the rooster site seems to assume a single coil whereas we have two on our BM's, but I assume this is not a problem.

[Semper Gumby]

Interesting.  I may try a Rooster Booster Jr on the Montesa.  And then there is the Thunderbolt dual points.

[Barry]

May come back for your guidance on the wiring, the rooster site seems to assume a single coil whereas we have two on our BM's, but I assume this is not a problem.

No problem at all you just treat the two coil in series as one with the link wire in between them. So to fit a Rooster Booster the green wire will go to #1 on the front coil and the yellow wire will go to #15 on the rear coil.

[RSMike]

Thanks again, I have just ordered the 12V negative earth rooster booster (that's the right one isn't it, the fact that we have 6V coils always sounds odd, but I guess two 6v coils in series gives a 12v drop, right?).

One other question, so if I make up my own double spade connector for connecting the points ( I have an old condenser as I fitted a new one when trying to track down my misfire a while back, so I guess I can just clip that off and use), I can then just leave the existing condenser in-situ, albeit with a dangling double spade connector?

[Barry]

Thanks again, I have just ordered the 12V negative earth rooster booster (that's the right one isn't it, the fact that we have 6V coils always sounds odd, but I guess two 6v coils in series gives a 12v drop, right?).

Yes that's the right one

One other question, so if I make up my own double spade connector for connecting the points ( I have an old condenser as I fitted a new one when trying to track down my misfire a while back, so I guess I can just clip that off and use), I can then just leave the existing condenser in-situ, albeit with a dangling double spade connector?  

The problem is you need to make a connection to the points but without a condenser being in circuit because it's not required for the electronic ignition.

To make a connection to the points you need the plastic block with the double sided spade connector which fits in the square hole in the side of the bean can. Just snip the wire off.  The block is normally held in place by the clamp on the condenser so you can either fit the old condenser with the wire cut off or fit the new condenser and leave the termination block and wire dangling perhaps with some protection to keep it clean and undamaged.

Another solution would be to cut the clamp section off the old condenser and store your new condenser somewhere safe on the bike. You are gong to need tools to fit it so perhaps it could go in the tool roll.

I did consider breaking the condenser wire in the middle and fitting insulated connectors so the condenser could be left out of circuit but thought the wire was a bit too short to do this successfully.

[RSMike]

I did consider breaking the condenser wire in the middle and fitting insulated connectors so the condenser could be left out of circuit but thought the wire was a bit too short to do this successfully.

Hmm, that would be a nice solution, I could snip both of my condenser's to have enough wire, the question is will I be brave enough to do that,  

I pinged Chris Gamble at Rooster Ignitions and he says he has "many happy BMW owning customers".

I'll do some pics of the installation when I get it and get around to fitting.

[wa1udg]

The first "solid state" ignitions for auto use were simple transistor switches, and a "Hall Effect "  trigger on the distributor shaft.  Chrysler was first to adopt them here.  Adding a transistor switch to the BMW is a good idea, "point erosion" from switching  coil current is eliminated, BUT, the rubbing block which rides the cam wears,  and so the "dwell l angle" must be reset once in a while.  That can be done with a "dwell meter"  although the factory point gap provides the correct dwell.  A better approach would be a system which eliminates the points.  Later,  "capacitive discharge" systems came along using an inverter to raise the 12 volts to several hundred, giving the coil a good whack.  They put extra stress on stock ingntion components and while the sharp pulse worked great at high rpm it  didn't  work well with lean idle mixtures.  The systems in the "coil over plug" setups  used today have solved the pulse duration problem.  I can remember when the old timers siad the addition of a couple of transistors to an auto ignition system would creat "durability issues".  They ought to see what it takes to run a computer  controlled, coil over plug system.  

[wa1udg]

BTW I installed a number of Heathkit CD systems on cars and a couple of boats with points.  Those systems retained the points as the trigger.  The Heath instructions didn't indicate the capacitor (condenser) needed to be removed and there was a switch on the Heatrhkit box which allowed you to return to "stock" operation at any time.  Only trouble I ever had was getting carried away with "rubbing block lubrication" - some got in the points when the distributor warmed up and disrupted the trigger signal .  Happened on RT 128 near Boston in rush hour.  I pushed the switch to the "stock" position and figured it out later.

[RSMike]

Got my rooster booster and fitted today, seemed pretty straightforward.

(1) Disconnect condensor



(2) Connect up, Points connection off front coil and connect to red wire, Green wire to front coil (#1), Yellow wire to rear coil (#15), Blue wire to battery negative.



(3) Strap unit to frame


Starts up fine and seems to idle better, more evenly, but once I go on the road and open up, she stumbles, and farts along, no power

double checked the connections, Not much else to check, have I missed something obvious?,  :-/

[Justin B.]

Check connections and make sure it's well grounded.  Oh, "Rooster Booster" in my neck-of-the-wods is a brand of energy drink!

[Barry]

Starts up fine and seems to idle better, more evenly, but once I go on the road and open up, she stumbles, and farts along, no power.  double checked the connections, Not much else to check, have I missed something obvious?,

From studying your picture it looks to me like the booster is correctly wired. I don't think it would even run and idle if it wasn't.

You may have a weak spark once the engine is under load but I can't think why unless the booster unit is faulty.  Does it run OK when you switch back to points? If so I'd contact Rooster Ignitions to see if they can shed any light on it.


I know you will want to make it work properly first but once it does work here's something else to think about. I can see that the Rooster Booster installation diagram shows the blue earth wire connected directly to the battery. In the case of an airhead I wouldn't do it that way. When for the usual reasons you disconnect the battery earth lead at the speedo clamp bolt (or wherever it might be connected)  there remains a risk that there is still an earth path through the Rooster Booster.  I think it would be better to just connect it to the nearest frame earth point.  I used one of the rear coil clamping screws.

[RSMike]

Thanks Barry, I checked/double checked everything this morning, but still can't really get above about 15mph! , so I guess I will revert to the old setup this evening, just to verify, It will at least mean I can get the connector in place for the condenser for any future attempts.

Good point on the earth, I figured any earth point should do , but just to be sure, I followed the instructions to the T and connected to the -ve terminal.

I have dropped Rooster ignitions a line in case there are any other troubleshooting tips.

Bean can will have to come off to refit the condenser, which means resetting the timing, PITA, that's what I was hoping to eliminate.

======================================

UPDATE: Response from Chris at Rooster Ignitions ( For Airhead forum read R65 forum):


Mike,

Just followed your thread on the Airhead forum and have seen the many followers and conmentors on the topic.

OK... for your problem....

1., Check that the voltage regulator is not passing any more than 14.4v at ANY throttle settings even momentarily on blipping.

2., With the RB1 fitted the ignition coil response can be received quicker meanung that the ignition timing may need to be slightly retarded. With a distributor this is easy and can be performed with the engine running for fine tuning.

3., If neither of these things cure your issues then please let me know and I will replace the module,

On other issues mentions...

1/. We also produce contactless ignition triggers and total CDI modules with built in CDI ignition coils for custom built solutions and also some batteryless solutions  In most practical cases however the RB1 and RBJ solutions are more than adequate and cost effective.

2/. I am well aware that there are other products using the Rooster Booster logo, including energy drinks and chicken feeders. This is the reason the company is called Rooster Ignitions and not Rooster Booster... a tag line that we actually copied from the 1970's Paxo Stuffing TV adverts lol.

Best of luck...

[nhmaf]

It does tend to sound like your ignition advance is not advancing at all, or the timing is behaving as quite retarded. Hmm.