Champ

Champ

Well Known Member
For an RV-8 rear battery mount Van's Drwg OP-10 shows the master solenoid mounted right side up with the battery pole inboard and the load pole outboard. This is great except the Cole Hersee 24115 solenoid Vans supplied has opposite handed poles to this. Cables therefore have to cross over one another and the load cable is very tight to the F-818-L baggage rib.

Solutions would be:
1. Invert the solenoid like the starter solenoid thus reversing pole orientation. a.Vans say they have not heard of this being done. b.Cole Hersee has not returned calls to tech support. c.I couldn't find anything on this after searching VAF.
2. Replace the solenoid with one with opposite handed poles. Does one exist?
3. Stay right side up & severely kink the load cable around the baggage rib or loop it aft & then forward to better clear the baggage rib. Both kind of messy & loop uses more cable than I have.

What say you on VAF?

PS - Vans wondered why I wasn't firewall mounting the battery (Odessey PC680). Don't need to start or add to a thread on this as the subject has already been beat to death.
 
Although the solenoid housing has a BAT stamp on one pole, from the schematic it looks to me like it dosen't matter which side is battery & which is load. Must be a universal housing. Good thing there's no such thing as a stupid question.
 
Dennis:

I thought it did matter because the coil is internally connected to the Battery terminal. Connected backwords it would not work.
 
Master Solenoid Operation

Thanks for the reply from Anchorage. We just got back from Alaska - loved it. Spent a couple of days in Anchorage. Suffering withdrawl from Alaskan Amber. I'll recheck the pole thing.
 
It does matter

The master solenoid must be connected to the battery on the BAT terminal to work correctly. If it is connected to the other terminal, when you ground the master switch, nothing will happen since the battery power is used to close the magnetic switch inside the solenoid.
The other option you have is to turn the battery around in the holder.
Good luck.
 
Thanks Steve. I agree it does make a difference. I was looking at the schematic for the 4 pole instead of the 3 pole I have. Reversing the battery does eliminate cable crossing but the solenoid location still results in a close encounter between the load cable and the left baggage rib. Cable routing can overcome this. It just won't be as neat.
 
Contactor orientation

I would like to add my question to this thread. Does it matter if the master contactor is not right side up? Can it be sideways or upside down? Same question for the starter contactor? Thanks Lyle
 
According to the experts (Bob Nuchols, et al) the physical orientation doesn't matter. You can hang them upside down if you want.
 
Great. The wiring from my rear battery mount will be neater with less chance of chaffing with an inverted master solenoid. Thanks for the replies.
 
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