When I bought this '82 Special around 1.5 years ago, she was stock and ran fine. I then went down the frustrating and fruitless path of installing a PMA kit and capacitor... After some advice and parts from the people who make this forum so great I went back to a stock charging system, and now she runs just fine again.
Some of the mods I've made:
-headers off an earlier model
-wheels off a '79 (I think that's the only year you could get a "16 aluminum rear wheel)
-repro tank for an XT500 or SR500 (not sure which, or if there is a difference with their steel tanks)
-Mikuni VM34 carbs w/Uni pods
-Rewound rotor from Custom Rewind
-PAMCO ignition
-ACCEL coil
-Antigravity lithium battery
-Hagon rear shocks
-Race Tech fork springs
*lowered the front and rear by 1"
-HHB fork brace
-Joe Wiseguy swingarm brace
Oh man, the time and money I've dumped into this project... I learned a lot the hard way, but I can't imagine how much time I would have wasted or money I would have burned if I didn't have your experience to guide me. Thank you, ALL.
And I didn't do it all myself. I had a lot of help from the team over at Lucky Wheels Garage in LA,
https://www.luckywheelsgarage.com/
https://www.instagram.com/luckywheelsgarage/
Thank you, Jackson, Ty, Morgan, Mason and, most importantly, Manny.