New Fast Magneto

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19732, 10 September 1938, Page 9

New Fast Magneto

FORMERLY a commonplace on motor * cars, the magneto has practically vanished, having been replaced by the cheaper coil ignition, which draws its current from the battery. Few people who took up motoring within the last few years would know how a magneto operates. It is a selfcontained unit which generates its own electrical current and distributes it to the sparking plugs. While it is now practically obsolete for cars, many thousands are still manufactured annually for aviation work, stationary engines, motcr-bodt engines, and motor-cycles. Racing motor cars still use it because it is light and obviates the need of a heavy battery with a charging dynamo. Recently, a well-known Ep'’' : manufacturer of car electrical eoiiin. ment produced a new magneto specially designed for the running internal combustion ethe world, that of the remarkable little Austin Seven racing car.

engine has a potential speed of 12,000 r.p.m., but has not yet been ext-. r. - ■- to this speed. The new magneto is claimed in its turn to be the fastest in existence, because it is capable of delivering efficient ignition when its armature is running at 14.000 r.p.m. As the distributor is a magneto designed for a fourcylinder engine runs at twice armature speed, this means that the instrument delivers 28,000 sparks per minute—a fantastic figure. At the lower end of the scale, this special magneto must also be capable of supplying sparks at 25 r.p.m. An interesting feature of the new instrument is that it is designed so that it can be mounted vertically or at an angle. It can therefore bo used on cars originally designed for coil ignition, the magneto taking its drive from the fixtures originally fitted for the coil system’s distributor.