Was on my way back home the other night and the bike just died. No funny sounds, or change in brightness of lights. It was as if i had just switched the cut out. Tried it a few times after i pulled over and it fired once or twice and then nothing.
Got it 2 a house (after pushing it along way :/) and discovered theres no spark to any of the plugs.
I am planning to take some tools and a multimeter in a couple days and try 2 find out whats wrong with it and either take it 2 a garage or get some parts.
I can check resistance on pickup and ignition coils. If they check out ok, is there anything else i should check.
Its not the cut out or ignition switches as they still work ok. Or is there another kill switch in the ignition switch that could have fried and left everything else working perfectly.
I am wondering if its the cdi unit but these are not guaranteed and are expensive. Is it atall possible to test them?
Are there any other components in the ignition system before the ignition coils and after the pickup coils that would cause this? Or is it only pickup-cdi-coils? Have recently changed coils and its unlikely they would both stop working at the same time.
Checked the fuses they dont appear fried but i didnt have a multimeter when i checked them so cant be 100%. Is there even a fuse for this circuit? Are there any other fuses located elsewhere that could be the problem?
I dont have a manual either and ive only found a parts of a couple chapters online thats no use for this fault. I did find resistance spec for afew components tho.
Any insight or advice will be greatly appreciated.
Answers & Comments
Verified answer
Most bikes have the ignition on the main fuse, so if the ignition quits because of a blown fuse, everything, lights and all go. So forget that. Your bike's a 4 cylinder, right? If so, then don't waste your time fiddling with the ignition coils or the pickup. You have two of each for each pair of cylinders. Two cylinders could fail because of the coil or pickup, but not both together, so forget that also.
Next is the ignition switch and possibly the kill switch. On Kawasakis, if the kill switch of off, the starter won't work. On my old Honda the kill switch could be off and it would still crank. I don't know about your bike, you'll have to ask someone more familiar with your bike. Ignition switches have several different contacts in operation when the bike is running. My Kaw Voyager has 6 contacts in use when it's running. I know because I recently had the switch apart to clean the contacts. You might try twisting the key slightly past "on" and see if that works. My bike suddenly died 400 miles from home and after pulling the tank and checking every fuse and relay, twisting the key worked on my bike and that's why I had the switch apart. My bike also has the kill switch bypassed. They were another weakness of my model bike and many have be wired around. The switch ckecks out ok with continuity tests but won't work otherwise. So don't automatically assume the kill switch is ok. You need to get your multi meter and see if you have 12V (or close to it) at the ignition coils. If so, that eliminates the ignition and kill switch.
If you don't have 12V at the coils, then you will want to check to see if you have current reaching the ignition box. You'll want a wiring diagram for that because I have no idea of the color schemes Yamaha uses. If you do, then the input side is ok. You'll also want to check the output side where the wires go to the ignition coils. This is where it gets tricky. If you have an ordinary electronic transistorized ignition, with the ignition switch on you will have approximately 12V leaving the box to each ignition coil. If you have substantially less than 12V, then you may have trouble with the box. I'll get to that later. If you have a true CDI, then you won't have voltage leaving the box. That doesn't mean the box is ok,you'll need a Yamaha manual to do the proper checks.
Now to the later, you say you replaced the coils. Did you get coils with the proper primary resistance? Do you know what I'm talking about? You check the resistance with a multi meter attached to the two small wires at the coil. You need a ditigal meter set really low on the resistance scale, like 10 ohms or less. If you have transistorized ignition, the resistance will probably be aproximately 2.5-3 ohms. If you have CDI, it will probably be closer to 1 ohm. If you have transistorized and the coils you installed are for a CDI ignition, you could have fried the insulating material between the 2 main switching transistors and the heat sink. If so, there's a good chance the voltage between the box and coils will be much lower than 12V, like 7-9V and the coils will get good and hot. And maybe even get hot enough to bust open. (Been there and done that.)
If that has happened to your box, all is not lost. If you can get the box apart and that's is the problem, the transistors can be loosened from the circuit board and new insulators and heat conducting grease applied. To use the existing coils, you'll need to add an ordinary automotive ballast resistor between the source and the + line to the ignition coils. The size you need will depend upon the resistance of the new coils and what the old ones were. So you would probably be looking at a resistor of 1.8-2.1 ohms. Any auto parts store should have a big book with resistors and their resistance shown.
I don't know how your ignition box is designed and if it can be opened up or not. If that is the problem and you want to try to repair it google "vision ignition". There's a site that has photos of how to open a Yamaha Vision box. Those were notorious for failing because of bad internal connections. Good luck.