Any of you guys have the Wyze probe? I just bought the 24 inch Wyze probe. Mailman dropped it of yesterday and I was excited to try it out. Got a 2003 F250 5.4 (COP) and 1998 Civic 1.6 (distributor) setting in the yard. First off tried the Honda, worked well on it. I was able to get good wave form on my Verus Edge by holding the prob tip at the distributor cap were the plug wire meets the cap. I could also get a decent but not great waveform at the plug end of the wire. Defiantly worked better at the cap. Now on to the the COP on my 5.4. I was NOT able to get a waveform by holding the tip of the probe flat on top of the coil. I tried every coil with no luck. Not sure if i had it setup wrong but i dont think i did. I used the presets in the Verus. Was set at 15k with a trigger. Cant remember time base.Tried inverting it,no change. Trace was almost a flat line. Its worth mentioning the coils have been replaced in the past. All 8 of them are after market. The cheap ones you get on ebay. Truck runs great i was just playing around with the new prob but it does concern me i couldn't get a waveform. The hard to get to 5.4 coils is why i bought the longer 24 inch Wyze probe. An ideas what went wrong? Maybe the aftermarket coils? I did try it again on the honda after it failed on the ford. I didn't change anything, used the same setup and it worked fine on the honda .
You find you can find two known good COP from different coil manufacturers on the same vehicle that give completely different secondary primary and secondary waveforms and some COPs are just about impossible to get a secondary from.
" We're trying to plug a hole in the universe, what are you doing ?. "
(Walter Bishop Fringe TV show)
Andy.MacFadyen wrote: You find you can find two known good COP from different coil manufacturers on the same vehicle that give completely different secondary primary and secondary waveforms and some COPs are just about impossible to get a secondary from.
I noticed this on a Altima 2.5 once while using my amp clamp. Had two stock coils and two aftermarket coils. The amp ramp was completely different between the stock and aftermarket. The control signal was diffrent as well.
You'll have much better luck holding the tip of the probe at the very base of the coil, close to the cylinder head, preferably touching the rubber boot. This is where I always find the strongest/cleanest signal.
Great info regarding setup. That's where newbies to scoping lack. If someone were to create a book for scope setup and go over the different types of cop's, coils, coil packs, sensors, waveform settings for various stuff and recommended settings, recommended timebase, etc I'd probably buy the book especially if it was in a reference style format meaning a handy book that one could keep on them, close by , paper format or paper and PDF format for pulling it up.
Would be even better if you select the year, make, model of vehicle and select what you're testing and it automatically sets and has a guided tour for the inexperienced. They'd have less people intimidated by these using them more and getting top notch diagnostics done with man hours saved, shops profitable. One thing would be to have a check mark where one could uncheck a box if they don't want or want the guided tour for setting up.
IF I knew programming I'd be finding me some mastertechs and partnering up and creating a platform to sell to scope mfrs to integrate with their software.
One of the very few disadvantages of virtual scopes that work through a PC or tablet style interface is it takes longer to scroll through the settings, even if the scope has presets it can take a while to scroll to the right one. I mainly use an Owon bench style labscope that can't store many pre-sets but has real knobs you can twiddle very rapidly and has an autoset feature that will set a stable wave form up all on its own.
In the end it all boils down to getting used to the scope and having a rough starting point for screen time and voltage settings from there you can play with the trigger and aquisition settings.
The Pico website guided test pages and videos are always a good guide.
" We're trying to plug a hole in the universe, what are you doing ?. "
(Walter Bishop Fringe TV show)
bruce.oliver wrote:
Automotive Oscilloscope
Your first paragraph sounds a lot like this book. I've heard great things about it and have it on order.
Your second paragraph sounds a lot like snapon scopes. While not perfect their guided component tests can be helpful
Funny.you mention that book as I'd broke down and bought it between my post above and today while going thru and looking at replies to threads I'm watching or have commented on. Looks as if it'll be a great read.
I never set a trigger until I know my scaling is right.
As far as COP probes go, I've seen coils that are so well insulated I can never get a reading. Additionally, the probe is sensitive to placement and pressure against the coil. When possible I like to use extension leads and a capacitive pickup. I feel the results are more consistent.
Sometimes they bury coils so a cop probe is there only practical option. So I do use it sometimes.
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