John, going back to motorcycle COP's surely these wouldn't have a problem with the heat? Motorcycle engines get alarmingly hot and I doubt ther is much airflow where they would be?
Most/all of the motorcycle coils are designed for a CDI system which doesn't have the long duration charging current that an inductive system has. Unfortunately, the "good" CDI's are nearly as expensive as the standalone ECU's, and the less expensive ones are obviously less expensive for a reason judging by all the negative comments I've seen and heard about them.
Sooooo..... back to using an inductive system, but inductive coils work by getting charged up a relatively long time (dwell) at fairly high current levels, so they tend to run pretty hot, and if you overdo the dwell a bit, you fry the coils. So the combination of having to live down in the DOHC hellhole, and an inductive ignition running lots of current probably isn't conducive to a long life for the poor COP. Hmmm, sounds like I should be looking closer at those premium CDI systems.....
But wait, if you use the style of COP which is called a "plug top" COP, they put the windings of the coil in a potted module up on top, rather than running them through the body, as is done with the "pencil" style COP's that motorcycles run. So I figure if all the heat sensitive, high current bits are up on top, exposed to some air flow, and they're mounted on a nice aluminum heatsink, they should have a better chance of surviving. We'll see.
First I have to find some inductive type coils that are long enough for the job.
