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Fuel System Manager
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Ceengland



Joined: 11 Oct 2020
Posts: 398
Location: MS

PostPosted: Tue Mar 10, 2026 8:54 am    Post subject: Re: Fuel System Manager Reply with quote

Planes that run Continental fuel injection systems with fuel regulator 'bypass' flow going to one particular tank in a multitank airplane have crashed due to the pilot not noticing that he's pumping fuel overboard.

I never understood why the FAA certified the design in the 1st place; there are several very effective cures for the problem.

Just sayin'...


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Eric Page



Joined: 15 Feb 2017
Posts: 274

PostPosted: Thu Mar 26, 2026 3:04 pm    Post subject: Re: Fuel System Manager Reply with quote

Project update:

Circuit boards and components for Pete's low fuel warning module arrived and I built up a prototype. It behaved strangely when powered with 14V and didn't work at all when powered with 28V. Not very helpful in a 28V aircraft!

I discovered a couple of design errors:

1) The pads for the 12V voltage regulator had the input and output pins swapped, resulting in ~26V where there should have been 12V. This exceeded the 18V max for the SA555P timer IC, causing it to behave erratically. Miraculously, it survived the abuse.

2) The unused input pins for the second comparator in the LM2903P were tied directly to ground. This was changed to 10k and 10M pull-down resistors, per Texas Instruments Application Report SNOAA35B, page 13: https://tinyurl.com/bdfvewje+

With the first problem fixed by rotating the voltage regulator 180 degrees, the module works as expected: when the LO_SNSR input has 28V removed so it's open circuit, there's a delay of 20 seconds, after which the EFIS_ALM output pulls low and the LED+ output begins to oscillate. Re-applying 28V to LO_SNSR resets the module.

I've updated the schematic (attached to this post) and PCB layout. New boards and components are on the way. I'll report again when I have the new board assembled and tested.


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Low Fuel Warning Module (Rev C).pdf
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 Filename:  Low Fuel Warning Module (Rev C).pdf
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