82 spectre, 1&4 plugs not firing, new dyna pickups

Good afternoon gentlemen (and Ladies),

I'm tired of being pissed about this bike, its been a hassle all summer. Owned for 4 years now, all the major issues have decided this was the summer I wouldn't ride. I've done a lot of researching it, how ignition coils and pick-up coils work, and the wiring surrounding the whole system. Now just hitting this wall of WTF.

Beginning of summer it had, starter issues: Rebuilt the starter (barely one brush hanging on for dear life), put a new solenoid in as well. Was starting up fine. However, entered the heat created issues in the coils. In Philly we had a solid month of 95+ degree heat... kept it under a cover that entire time.

After it cooled down, it was time to attack the problems.

Resistance tests showed that the ignition coils were on their way out. Pick up coils looked like they weren't doing too well either. Lower Ohms than should be. While heat testing it with a hair dryer..... it plummeted a crazy amount.

Ordered new "used" ign. coils from ebay. (not a lot of cash for brand new ones and knowing the pick ups were going to have to be brand new, this was the only choice.) They went in and seem to be reading right.

As for the pick-ups, went with a Dyna ignition system. And if I'm correct they have you bypass the IC Ignitor/CDI? Or have I read the wiring wrong? Directions and what I've found on the internet seem to have it going straight to the ignition coils. Resistance from the Dyna looks right. Resistance from it to the primary coils looks right.

...and right about the time I tried to test the secondary leads my (rather new, digital, non auto ranging) multimeter started getting a bit wonky. Raising ohms as it sat there not hooked up to anything, resistance across the two test leads too. However the raised ohms stayed proportional to all the previous reads (i.e. if you subtracted the test lead number from the new, higher primary coil read.)

So, wont start. Checking if the plugs fire, by using the plug to the engine block test... 2 & 3 fire, weak, but fire.... 1 & 4, not at all. Even try the old ignition coils hooked up to the plugs, nothing on 1 & 4. Put the 2& 3 coils to the other plugs, they fire, its not the plugs. Pull out the wiring from both red wires from their junction point from the pick ups to the ign coils, looks fine.

Can anyone point me in another direction? All of this seems to point to something between the pick up coils and the primary leads. But i'm just stumped now.

Thanks a ton.

do u have 12 volts going to each coils? no u don't use the ignitor.don't no if this helps,but I wasn't getting full 12 volts to coils so I did this. www.wgcarbs.com/index.php/using-joomla/e...-categories/89-coils

Download the testing from Dyna. You need a pdf reader, like adobe acrobat.
www.powercommander.com/downloads/Support...Manuals/DynaSTSG.pdf
OMR has these write ups in File Base also: www.kzrider.com/filebase/doc_download/46...-s-coil-installation
www.kzrider.com/filebase/doc_download/44...-installation-by-omr

Could attach signal wire from front Dyna-S to 1/4 coil and see whether 1/4 plugs fire using the plug to the engine block test.

Good Fortune!

Welp...

Found out it was 2 seperate issues. Volt tested the battery before & while pressing the start button. Dropped from 12+ to around 6 volts. Bad battery is assumed. I Barely used it. Bought it new at the beginning of summer. I don't have luck with batteries.

2nd issue: Switched the wiring coming from the Dyna modules. After all the resistance testing I decided to just switch the module to the right (2&3) and it fired the 1&4 plugs well. Looked at the 1&4 module closely, hairline crack on the housing. Guessing I managed to screw it up installing it & it was just enough to cause a problem.

Sooo, I'm officially done. I'm not going to sink anymore $ into it. Spent all my time working on it this summer & barely road it. Was a good bike for a couple years and it will be missed greatly... But its time to sell it.

Thanks for all your suggestions, much appreciated.
Nate

If the battery is three months old, there's no way it isn't covered under warranty. No bike battery, no matter how cheap, should fail in three months. Take it back and get a new one.

I wouldn't necessarily assume that you broke the Dyna housing. There are lots of places along the way from manufacturing to you that could have dropped or otherwise damaged the part. It never worked, so the supposition that it was your handling sounds a little more like self-pity than logic. Call Dyna and find out if they will replace it or test it and see what's up. If so, you're not out a dime. If not, you might be right - it might be time for the old girl to go to 'a farm' where she can run free.

hey don't give up.i've been fighting mine for over a year now.thinking it was ignition got a dyna s ignition got coils taken carbs on and off so many times now can't count rejetted carb(4 to 1 exhaust).iv'e gottin so frustrated walk away for couple weeks.then go back at when money there.i even bought a 1980 Suzuki gs1000 to ride,BUT i'm not goin to let the bike win,besides 750 spectre is a lot of fun to ride.

spectre25 wrote: Welp...

Found out it was 2 seperate issues. Volt tested the battery before & while pressing the start button. Dropped from 12+ to around 6 volts. Bad battery is assumed. I Barely used it. Bought it new at the beginning of summer. I don't have luck with batteries.

2nd issue: Switched the wiring coming from the Dyna modules. After all the resistance testing I decided to just switch the module to the right (2&3) and it fired the 1&4 plugs well. Looked at the 1&4 module closely, hairline crack on the housing. Guessing I managed to screw it up installing it & it was just enough to cause a problem.

Sooo, I'm officially done. I'm not going to sink anymore $ into it. Spent all my time working on it this summer & barely road it. Was a good bike for a couple years and it will be missed greatly... But its time to sell it.

Thanks for all your suggestions, much appreciated.
Nate

Totally up to you of course what you do with your bike.
What was the original reason for going with the Dyna in the first place? Was the Stock ignition junk? They are very very tough and have few issues. Its usually in the wiring, or coils. If you still have the factory Ignition I would test it. You can of course get help here at KZR for testing the stock parts, and the Factory Service Manual shows how to test each component. You may find that it needs little to work with the stock ignition.
Another possibility is to find a Dyna S that has 1 bad side, and use the good one to fix yours. Someone here on KZR should have one, that has one bad side, as that seems common with the Dyna S.
You can also get in touch with Dyna, and see if they will exchange it, for a low amount of money.
Hate to see anyone get frustrated to the point of selling their ride. :dry:

Thanks everyone for the responses despite me deciding to throw in the towel... as wells as the "self pity" callout. With that being said, I've contacted the battery seller (via amazon) and the Dyna S Ignition seller (via ebay). Let you know what I find out.

The stock pick ups were failing under heat distress. Started cold (after turning over a couple times.) After a ride, it wouldn't want to start. Checked the resistance, low but in range. Tested it while heating it up with a hair dryer.... Ohms dropped super low. I couldn't find any used pick ups at a reasonable price and it seemed everyone on the forums were suggesting that with a 30 year old bike, going with a 30 year old part you were unsure of, didn't make sense anyways. So I decided on the Dyna.

This bike was a $300 deal I bought years ago on Craigslist... seized brakes and it really just needed a healthy carb clean. Always had small electrical issues, someone made a mess of the wiring to the tail lights, faulty (main) fuse harness, etc. This summer it just decided to keep my guessing. From starter to ignition. Probably a response to the fact I couldn't garage it the last two years. Covering it only gets you so far. I actually had fun for a bit trying to diagnose it... Just tired of putting money into something that still isn't fixed after I thought I "figured" it out. Especially when that amount of money is close to the amount I paid for it. Eventually "you should sell it" from everyone starts making sense.

I'm gonna wait till I get the responses on warranties and decide from there.

Great idea on trying to find another working module from someone here. Never would have thought of that.
Thanks again.

Could create a want-ad topic in Classifieds.

Good Fortune!

No eBay APP ID and/or Cert ID defined in Kunena configurationWho knows how much this might end up selling for?