# Component Identification



## Keepvogel (Jan 11, 2021)

Hi guys!

I hope this is a quick question; I am just trying to figure out what kind of component this is:


















The back reads "7" and "M 072". There are no other markings. The black wire hooks up to the thin wire on the ignition coil & main coil ground wire & control panel ground wire. The metal cover was screwed onto the cast aluminum housing. Its resistance measures 0.9kΩ.

Background: It's from a Falcon R900 generator; mostly a Subaru/Robin R600 copy, except for a few details including this mystery part. I received the R900 broken, and I removed lots of carbon crud from the exhaust and cylinder which made it run. But the governor was way off: RPM way too high, with ± 550VAC on the output (should be nominal 220VAC). I shut it off quickly, unfortunately the DC rectifier and the ignition coil were already busted. Fortunately all else including the rotor coils still test fine, except I have no idea what even is the purpose of this little guy - let alone how to test it or when to blame any further running problems on it. So if possible, I'd like to know before I attempt to run it again with the new ignition coil & rectifier, lest I blow up something again


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

snap a pix of the gen set.
so far i have yet to see any info on the mfg....
so how much electrical engineering test gear do you have?
try a cap tester, then try a coil tester to test for uh.
single wire, it could also be a tilt sensor for turn over shut down.

as for the high output.
is this an inverter or avr unit?
if it is avr, replace the avr unit. or do some major testing on the gens stator and rotor coils.

any idea of what it cost new?
or how many watts output?


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

if it is robin
*click here for the coil test page *
*or just down load that whole manual for free.
the unit looks to be a cap style gen set...
so also test the cap on the stator as well as the diode on the rotor and brushes.*


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## Keepvogel (Jan 11, 2021)

iowagold said:


> try a cap tester, then try a coil tester to test for uh.
> single wire, it could also be a tilt sensor for turn over shut down.
> 
> as for the high output.
> ...


Iowagold, thank you for your assistance! 

I don't have much EE test equipment, basically just my simple oscilloscope/multimeter that can do capacitance, but not inductance (UNI-T UT81C). I have plenty DC power supplies, but unfortunately no function generator for a DIY-inductance measurement.

I have tested the mystery component's capacitance; the meter displays "OL" so it's either too small or too big to measure. I then applied 3V to it in pulses, while watching the voltage on the oscilloscope which dropped off immediately - so I'm pretty sure there's no capacitance in it.

To see if it's some sort of tilt-sensor, I measured resistance while tilting/shaking/tapping the sides, but it remains just a static 0.9kΩ.

The Robin R600 manual is what I've used until now as it comes super close to this machine. All coils were within 150% of specification (so not really within spec, but that's not too strange as it's not exactly the same machine). As far as I can see they made a little error on the ignition coil specs; the secondary coil should be around 7.5kΩ, not 7.5Ω. My new, working ignition coil is 6.5kΩ. The capacitor is spot-on 10μF. The diode and resistor (14KΩ) on the (brushless) rotor were fine too 

If we can't figure out the purpose of the mystery part before the remaining part comes in somewhere next week (crankshaft oil seal), I'll just put it together and see what happens 😀

This four-stroke machine is rated at 700W, so it's a small one. I guess it's from the 80's or 90's, and I have no clue what it costs new. And yes, this Falcon is a strange brand. Mine is badge-engineered as a Spero, but I've seen the same R900 unit online branded as Falcon, Jasper, Taiko, Advanced Power Products, Brown, and there's probably more. All the parts have the same bird-logo though (pic 1), and my front panel has the name "Falcon" on it (pic 2, hard to see). All the "Spero" branding just consists of stickers they slapped on afterwards. (Spero is a local brand here in the Netherlands, I've contacted them but they don't know anything about these old machines anymore).


























Mine is apart right now until my new crankshaft seal comes in, but there's some good pics of the same unit (albeit with different stickers) here: Jasper R900 generator.

With the badge-engineering, I'd expect cheap build quality, but this machine feels pretty decent. Apart from most parts bearing the bird-logo (all aluminum parts, even the petcock), there's NTN bearings (Taiwanese), KOK oil seal (Taiwanese), Belden spark plug wire (USA) and the odd one out: She Lung capacitor (China).


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

yea lots of china and other country private label gens out there.
some the power regulation is all over the place.....

my favorite brand is the honda... and the eu series of the inverter gen sets.
they are spot on voltage and work well!!
but they cost a few bucks and are worth every dime!

hard to tell on the potted parts what they are....
most are some sort of load for the ignition circuits to help with low oil shut down.


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