Ford Motor Company Limited

Visteon Global Technolgoies, Inc.

Robert C Bauman

Robert L Hancock

James John Klocinski

Steven E Pritz

Shawn J Nowlan

William Douglas Walker

Rick S Burchett

Michael T Nation

David C Brecht

An ignition coil for an internal combustion engine minimizes the propagation of cracks in the encapsulate material surrounding the components of the ignition coil and provides a supplemental dielectric barrier. In one embodiment, the ignition coil comprises a housing, an outer core, an inner coil, and a coil assembly. The housing includes a bottom wall connected to an outer wall extending around the periphery of the housing. The outer core is positioned inside the outer wall, while the inner core is positioned inside the outer core. The coil assembly includes a primary winding and a secondary winding concentrically positioned relative to each other. The coil assembly is mounted to the inner core and positioned inside the outer core. The housing further includes an inner wall extending along the inner periphery of the outer core and positioned between the outer core and the coil assembly to prevent propagation of cracks.

Ignition coil with separating wall

A circuit board for an ignition coil in an internal combustion engine is provided. The ignition coil is in electrical connection with a control module and a spark plug having a pair of gap posts. The ignition coil includes a primary winding having an electrical current, a secondary winding in electrical connection with the spark plug and configured to induce a second electrical current between the gap posts, and an ionization current sensing integrated circuit configured to generate an ionization signal based on the secondary current between the gap posts. The ignition coil also includes a circuit board having an ionization connection in electrical connection with the secondary winding and with the ionization current sensing integrated circuit.

Using a circuit board for ignition coil internal connections

In one embodiment of the present invention, an ignition coil assembly includes a primary coil and a secondary coil. A primary connector assembly of the ignition coil assembly includes a conductor which is adapted to electrically connect one terminal of the primary coil with one terminal of the secondary coil. The conductor includes indentations which delimit a portion of the conductor and facilitate the removal of that portion of the conductor. The conductor further includes provisions for electrically connecting an electrical component such as diode in place of the removed portion of the conductor. The present invention thus facilitates inclusion of an electrical component such as a diode in applications which will benefit from the inclusion of the electrical component in place of the conductor.

Electrical component connecting provisions for an ignition coil

The present invention discloses an ignition coil assembly comprising a housing of molded plastic material. A coil assembly in the housing includes a primary coil member and a secondary coil member, the secondary coil member includes a high voltage output lead. The housing includes a base wall, and an integral cylindrical stem portion which extends outwardly from the base wall along an axis. A secondary coil output lead terminal member extends in the general direction of the axis through the base wall, and is connected to the high voltage output lead at one end and terminates in a clasp portion at its other end. The clasp portion is received within the annular stem portion. The annular stem portion includes an interior annular wall and an exterior annular wall. The clasp is concentrically located within the stem portion and is spaced therefrom to thereby provide an annular clearance cavity. A coil-type retaining spring is slidingly received at one end within the stem portion and is slidably secured to the clasp portion. The other end of the spring is adapted to grip a spark plug to establish electrical contact between the coil assembly and the spark plug.

Ignition coil

An ignition coil having primary and secondary coils, the primary coil wound around a central core member and including a permanent magnet made of a magnetic material that is less than fully dense, and is interposed between one end of the central core member and one end of an outer core surrounding the primary and secondary coil assembly and assuring the elimination of any air gap between the iron core and the central core member. The ignition coil further having a common modular design for a slip-in fit into differing modular housing designs depending upon the number of cylinders in the engine.

An ignition coil having annular primary and secondary coils, the primary coil wound around a central core member and including a permanent magnet made of a magnetic material that is less than fully dense, and is interposed between one end of the central core member and one end of a C-shaped iron core surrounding the primary and secondary coil assembly and assuring the elimination of any air gap between the C-shaped iron core and the central core member. Alternatively, the permanent magnet may be replaced with an electrically non-conductive shim of substantially equal dimension such that the energy output is substantially reduced and the charge/discharge interval substantially increased to thereby allow use of the same basic modularly constructed coil assembly for totally different ignition strategies.

An ignition coil having annular primary and secondary coils, the primary coil wound around a central core member and including a permanent magnet made of a magnetic material that is less than fully dense, and is interposed between one end of the central core member and one end of a C-shaped iron core surrounding the primary and secondary coil assembly and assuring the elimination of any air gap between the C-shaped iron core and the central core member.

Growing community of inventors

Flat Rock, MI, United States of America

Robert C Bauman