A LITTLE TIP for SMOOTHER RUNNING

[ANLAF]

Fellers,

There are many posts about mis-firing, kick-backs, poor timing. Here's a little tip that might just be your problem.

I put new HT leads on the bike today - one of the old ones failed last week and the juice arched to my leg (not pleasant!). Before it failed the bike was running smooth enough, but somehow I could never get the timing spot on, and on my tour of Wales last week (a decent 575 miles blast) the engine spluttered past 50 mph.

Well, I found it!
Such a simple thing, notw the engine is perfectly timed and running like a dream machine (for a 36-37 year old bike). What was it? - the HT leads were incorrectly attached at the coil end. And, believe me, it does matter. Strange, we take such a simple step for granted, but now the juice goes down those leads as it should at all speeds.

And, oh yes, for those of you who can never get the idle right, or there is some racing then dying, etc, this is something you might want to check.

One more thing, I have fallen for the trap of presuming HT leads last for ever - when you bend them and trap them changing plugs, etc, they can fail, or just get old and fail. Check them - there should be a very low resistance or change them.

Hope this helps.

Has anyone got the definitive way to attach the leads, dos and don't?

ANLAF

 

[XSLeo]

On any leads that have a screw down in the hole where the plug wire goes or into the caps. Trim 1/4 inch of the insulation back. spread the wires out in a starburst pattern. Now thread it down into the coil as far as you can. Sam e with the caps. On wires with the metal end that plugs into the coil, do the same but strip about 3/4 inch off the wire. bend out in the starburst then bend them down along the wire, then install the metal end.
Leo

 

[ANLAF]

Thanks XSLeo. How easy it is to overlook a small but very important job of getting that connection right. Mine have the metal adaptors that link the HT leads into the two openings on the Boyer micro-power coil.

ANLAF

 

[Tomterrific]

The one that stumps many is a break inside the wire. The plug will keep firing because the spark jumps the break. After many miles the wire erodes and the spark isn't powerful enough to jump the gap so the plug doesn't fire. Here's the rub, the plug fires fine out of the combustion chamber. It takes much more spark energy to fire the plug under compression.

Tom

 

[ANLAF]

That's interesting, Tom. New HT leads have made all the difference. During rebuilding and testing they get bent out of the way so many times that I could have damaged one or both as you describe. Add to that, if the HT lead is flexed in a certain way the copper might touch again to show continuity and (am I right here?) low resistance.

That's good info, and I will keep HT leads protected and well tested.

ANLAF