E-Mag woes...

[TwilightG]

So I recently purchased a used E-Mag off eBay for next to nothing.
As the saying goes, you get what you paid for
I'm also a complete n00b when it comes to E-Mags.

Just a little history on what's been done so far...
So the battery was pretty much discharged.. had the "Low Battery" message and a charger wasn't included. I hadn't aired it up yet but the solenoid wouldn't actuate, so I assumed it was the result of the low charge.

Bought a charging kit only to find that my battery wouldn't hold a charge. The light on the charger would go green after a few hours but once I put it back onto the E-Mag, "Low Battery" again.

So, I bought another used battery. It arrived fully charged, threw it on the E-Mag, no "Low Battery" message or anything.
Finally aired it up to try it out. As it turns out, the solenoid still is not actuating. I suspect that the HES is working fine because the "Trigger ON/OFF" message is working correctly.

Any ideas? As it is, this awesome deal is starting to cost me some money.. I might end up selling the marker once I get it working but that depends on how much I like it once it's properly tuned
If I need to drop a lot more money into it (like for a new solenoid) then I might just end up parting it.

BTW, it's running AGD 3.2, E-Mag valve w/ LVL10 (which also needs some tuning)

[TeamJackal37]

First make sure your safety is off, also make sure you have HP and above 1000psi in the tank, then try in M- mode before go any farther, Then tell us what happened after this.
Emag has 3 safety, Yellow plug, Switch between the E and M modes, the S-F switch above the grip.

[TwilightG]

Mech mode works fine.
Hybrid mode obviously works the same as mech since the solenoid isn't actuating.

My tank outputs around 800psi but I wouldn't think that would be a problem.

[BigEvil]

Check the trigger magnet. Make sure firstly that there is one, secondly, that it is close enough to the hes for it to read when the trigger is pulled all the way back.

The hes isnt something that usually goes bad, but who knows. If you cant get it running, best let someone take a look at it for you such as Tunaman.

[TwilightG]

Check the trigger magnet. Make sure firstly that there is one, secondly, that it is close enough to the hes for it to read when the trigger is pulled all the way back.

The hes isnt something that usually goes bad, but who knows. If you cant get it running, best let someone take a look at it for you such as Tunaman.

Yeah, there's a magnet. I'm almost certain that the hes is working because when I get to the "trigger" option on the board and pull the trigger, the display will read "on" and "off" for each trigger pull.

[211]

Check the solenoid plunger rod length, should be 3.005"
check the wires going to the solenoid

if the rod length is right, and you dont have any pinched or clipped wires you may need a new noid

[dark blade]

now... i might be half retarded, but for some reason i wanna say check the wiring from the solenoid and make sure its actually attached properly and that there arent any loose connections there. Other than that i would have to say that the only other thing it could be is that the solenoid is bad and needs to be replaced.

[FiXeL]

Either that, or the used battery you bought is bad too. I have a couple of those batteries that work great for the first 500 shots or so, and then they lack the juice to actuate the solenoid. Try the dealer section here, I have a few of those and they made quite a difference in some of my e/xmags.

[athomas]

Take the valve out and apply pressure to the back of the sear with your finger. Pull the trigger and see if the solenoid is actually moving without any air pressure pushing back.

[TwilightG]

So here's an update...

Removed the valve and body, pushed down on the back of the sear w/ my finger to act as an on/off.
Solenoid pulled the sear with no problems.
Put the valve back on and aired up, no worky... Hmm...

Tried some advice that ManiacMechanic gave me.. lightly pushed down on the plunger while pulling the trigger. With a few attempts, that worked just fine. Hmm... looks like the on/off of the valve is the culprit.

I know everyone says NOT to do this, but I have a spare ULT in my parts box. Put that in the valve and I was in business!!

Soo.. not really too sure where to go from here. I don't have a set of calipers to measure, but I suspect that I don't have an E-Mag on/off pin and the RT pin is causing too much force on the sear.

In the meantime, the ULT is still there and surprisingly works fine even though most threads I've read say that it doesn't provide enough return force to reset the noid/plunger. In my dry firing, I found that I was chuffing a little bit, even in E mode (which I think is really odd) but I also know that I'm not using a compatible on/off. I have not put any paint through this yet and dry-firing vs. paint-firing will make the valve behave a little different (hopefully less chuffing)

At some point, I will have to eyeball the difference in pin lengths between my X valve and E-Mag valve. I might just have to get a new pin from AGD. I need some extra carriers anyway because I have a LVL10 leak on the E-Mag valve that needs to be addressed too.

Does anyone know if there are any drawbacks to using the ULT for now? Could it cause any damage?

Thanks to everyone for all of their help!

[athomas]

A 0.750" retro on-off instead of an 0.712" emag on-off will not allow the valve to recharge, but the solenoid should still move the pin and the pin should reset the sear. You should hear it click.

If the solenoid plunger is too short, the solenoid will not have enough power to pull the sear when the on-off pin has air pressure on it. The ULT has less pressure so it wouldn't be affected like this. The problem with the ULT is that the heavy sear/solenoid assembly doesn't reset fast enough and will result in a slow recharge. A slow recharge will cause chuffing when you fire multiple shots.

The ULT will work as long as you don't expect to be able to fire shots at a high bps.

[BigEvil]

A 0.750" retro on-off instead of an 0.712" emag on-off will not allow the valve to recharge, but the solenoid should still move the pin and the pin should reset the sear. You should hear it click.

Actually, that could be hit or miss. Ive gotten them where they either wont fire, or fire like 3 bps with the longer pins.

Hey Twilight, see if your pin length is ok, then see if you can get your hands on another battery to try, one that you know to be good. Even if the battery charges and you get the green light it doesnt mean that the battery is ok.

[TwilightG]

Finally put some paint through it this weekend... it was chuff-tastic.

Needless to say, I'm trying to see if I can get an E-Mag on/off pin or an entire on/off assembly.
The ULT originally wasn't resetting the sear enough for the solenoid. I eventually got it to work but the recharge was definitely off. I even had some paint roll outs (probably from the intermittent chuffing)

*sigh* Unfortunately I'm still leaning towards selling it once I get everything tuned properly. I might change my mind once I get it ripping but I'm most likely going w/ a pneumag as my primary marker. (and I could really use the cash right now)