Apparently I need to pay attention

I will be the first to admit, my hearing sucks and I have hearing aids to the tune of several thousand dollars to prove it. This week I experienced failure of the pick-up plate wires for my Boyer ignition. On inspection I see the prior owner also had an issue with the wire to plate solder and used the PHD method to repair it. I put a new plate on today, timed the bike and it now runs better than ever since I have owned it. In hind sight, the bike has been sending me messages almost since the beginning and I wasn't paying close enough attention.

I have had an issue with the ignition light almost since I got it working. I found it would glow at idle, but go out as soon as the RPM went up. The problem was it would glow again after 3,000 revs. I checked and found the battery was charging and I couldn't find the source of the problem, so I ignored it. When I started the bike from cold, it ran like crap for several miles. It would mis-fire and sputter until it got up to running temp. I checked that off to the bike being cold blooded. On hard accelleration, the bike would often sputter as it approached redline. I couldn't find a reason, but she ran great other than that, so I ignored it.

After I put on the new pick-up plate today I took the bike out for a ride. It ran solid without skipping a beat from stone cold to running temp. After it warmed up, I put the spurs to her. She never skipped a beat. I have also noticed that pesky red ignition light does not come back on after 3,000 RPM.

I now deduce that one of the two wires on the place was broken, but held in place by the other. When the bike was cold, it did not make complete contact with the soldered stump and thus the poor performance. After the bike warmed up, things expanded enought to keep contact and keep spark. When I would get to higher RPM the broken wire would vibrate and not keep contact with the plate, thus the sputtering near redline. Also, with the broken wire vibrating, the ignition light would come back on as engine vibration increased. When the other wire broke lose, I was done for the day. Unfortunately I was on the freeway next to the fast lane. I managed to get to the shoulder before it quit all together.


She runs perfectly now. I just needed to pay closer attention to what she was telling me from the start. This is for those who might also not be paying attention to what our bikes are telling us.

I wasn't listening either. But I could smell it when my Boyer box finally went up in smoke leaving me stranded :evil: Thank Dog I had the old lady on the back to push :lol:

I do that all the time. By the time I figure out what is wrong, all the clues become so apparent, why didn't I think of it earlier.

Dave
69S

Greg Fauth norbsa@hotmail.com
sells an grade kit for the Boyer factory trip wires.
Its not if but when they will fail in bouncing Commando.

hobot

One day I was riding with my brother and we saw a Harley rider parked under a bridge. We stopped to ask if everything was OK, and he said he'd just stopped for a smoke. Then he points to my Norton and says, "You have an exhaust or head gasket leak". From 15 ft away he'd heard the pufft pufft of air escaping from a blown head gasket. Neither my brother or I had heard it - our old ears suck.