Speedo sensor for Stack

[charlie_pank]

Discovered a problem with the speedo and narrowed it down to the sensor. Is there any reason that I should fork out £150 for a Stack one instead of £1.23 for a magnetic reed-switch from Maplin?

[Shaun_E]

I can't tell you whether the £1.23 option will work but you certainly don't need to pay Stack prices.

I got mine here.

You will need to be able to add the Stack connector to it which is a bit fiddly but do a search for Stack connectors and there is some advice on doing it.

[charlie_pank]

Hmm, inductive eh? I've already pulled the wires out of the connect from the tacho, so that's no big deal.

 

Do you know what your the inductive sensor does, does it just make the circuit when it detects a ferrous object? I seemed to be able to simulate a wheel spinning by touching the correct wires out of the tacho together at regular intervals, hence I figured the reed switch would work with a magnet on the wheel.

[Benedict.]

I had a stack tacho/dash with integrated speedo on a previous (previous) car and found that the speedo sender from a ZX9-R motorcycle actually worked perfectly. The car had a ZX9-R engine and I just changed the angle of the sender to see prop bolts rather than sprockets.

 

Given that, I would suspect that a wide range of sensors available at bike (/car?) breakers would probably work for no more than coffee money.

 

Cheers,

Ben

[Shaun_E]

I'm fairly certain it just makes the circuit as you suggest (in fact the spec sheet says it can be normally open or normally closed).

I'm no expert on this stuff but I guess there are a couple of reasons for using this expensive sensor:

1) it uses the 4 bolt heads on the front hub to make the signal so no additional items required to be stuck on

2) it's waterproof/shock resistant, etc.

[charlie_pank]

Can I wire in a hall-effect sensor instead of the inductive sensor? Are they the same thing?

[stevethemook]

Ive just got one of these inductors from Speedy Cables..see bottom of page..

 

Speedy cables have modified my speedo to work with this as the original quill feeding the speedo sensor on my gearbox broke and I did not fancy taking out the box.

 

Still to fit in a couple of weeks after my holidays but all very easy.

 

Give them a ring just to check.

Steve

[charlie_pank]

Glued the reed switch (£1.73) in place at the weekend. Seems to talk to the Stack ok. I guess the disadvantage of a reed switch is that it has moving parts, so will wear out eventually, whereas a hall-sensor is solid-state.

 

This reed-switch is specified to manage 100million operations in its life, so if my wheel circumference were as small as 1m, I probably need to add it as something to replace in the service schedule at 62,500 miles. At that rate of consumption I'll be kicking myself that I didn't by a hall-sensor from Stack at 5,419,075 miles 😬

 

NB. I didn't include the expense of any magnets I may lose along my 5.5Mm of driving.

 

Edited by - charlie_pank on 19 Mar 2012 14:00:30

[charlie_pank]

It turns out there's a hall-effect sensor in the bike gearbox already. So, I'm wondering if I can use that. I have identified which wire that comes out of it is the reading, so presumably I can just stick that in to right wire of the stack. I still have some questions though:

 

1. Will it matter that I haven't attached the + and - wires of the stack to the sensor as the sensor already has a + and - feed?

 

2. Will the fact that the stack is reading from the sensor stop the ECU from reading from it at the same time?

 

 

[charlie_pank]

It didn't work 🙆🏻

 

The bike's (Hall-effect) speed sensor in the transmission receives a 5v feed from the ECU

The Stack speed sensor cable gives a 12v feed to its sensor so I guess there's not enough juice from the bike one.

 

I've ordered a spare bike sensor that I'm going to mount to count the OSR wheel studs, then rig it up to the 3 speedo sensor wires of the Stack. Benedict, did you have to do anything special to get the bike sensor to work with the stack? Does it matter which way around the + and - are connected to the sensor?

[Benedict.]

Charlie,

The ZX9R sensor worked connected straight to the stack input.

I had to mount it carefully so that the flat face that "saw" the original sprocket (nut?) on the bike, "saw" the prop bolts instead. This flat face was on the side, not the end.

 

I'm sure I just simply used the 2 central cores (not the grounded screen - I'm not even sure that it goes all the way to the sensor!) connected to the sensor

 

I honestly can't remember paying any attention to which way round they went, though it's a good few years ago now so I may have made reference to the wiring diagram for the ZX9.

 

Cheers,

Ben

[Benedict.]

... just noticed someone's selling compatible ones on eBay for half the price that Stack want, here

 

Cheers,

Ben