Are Boyers really that bad? (2015)

photoguy_43420 said:

The real question I have is it worth taking a working Boyer out and replacing it with a Tri-Spark or a Pazon? My bike runs good over all. Was not sure if the other where that much better? The other thought I had was to add a three phase alternator as you hear with the Boyer it needs more electric at ide and such. I have never really had the bike kick back, I have had a few miss fires. I would like to ride the Norton more this year and like to get it to run the best it could.

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Depends how rich you are. Or, how much you value the improvements to be had.
Back when, I couldn't afford a Boyer, or I'd have had one. Later when I could afford to finally leave my locked down auto advance unit behind, the lower price of the Boyer compared to the Tri-Spark didn't make up for its shortfalls.

Boyers are cheap & cheerful. Over the years I have had a few. The biggest problem with them is they are very variable in their advance curves. The Mark 3 I fitted to my 850 failed in the first week & was replaced FOC. The bike never kicked back unlike some, but would not idle reliably. I always put this down to carbs. Then after reading of a similar problem on this forum I fitted a Trispark. Instant idle! A year later the Trispark failed. It was replaced FOC.
On my Triumph 750 Tiger I had a Micro Digital. This had problems with cutting occasionally out due to ignition interference, even when fitted with 5K caps. The ultimate irony. It is now fitted with a Trispark & runs just as well as before, but no longer cuts out.
An A65 pinked badly with a Boyer but ran fine with the Lucas AAU & points. Yer pays yer money & takes yer choice.

Does anyone know if the advance curve of the Pazon differs from the Boyer? I've always had Boyers in my commandos and have never had a problem but if the ancient Boyer in my current 850 failed I would be inclined to try a Pazon.

Jerry sold me two spare sets of Boyer MK3 for my Commando MK3 which already has Boyer MK3 installed. When I carry both sets as spares I figure I have a Commando MK12.
These wires on these pickups are secured the same way as on my $1200 Pazon Smartfire for the project bike. It looks to be a good solution for wire breakage. I'm not sure if Jerry added the zap straps or if they are a factory item. The pickup on the installed Boyer has the wires secured in exactly the same fashion. Did Boyer add the zap straps after earlier problems?



The Boyer has always worked well on this bike, easy kickstarting, good idle and runs clean thru the rev range. As others have mentioned, you need to keep the voltage above 11.5 for this old analogue type, but you really should have that anyway.
Sometimes it would not work well with the electric start when cold. The voltage drop meant that even though the engine was rolling over briskly, it would not fire. As soon as the starter switch was released, the bike would start just with the continued motion due to momentum and the voltage increase.
Starting when warm was easy, no doubt the battery voltage was just that little bit higher after running for awhile.
Nowadays I just kickstart it, the Sprag eventually failed.

Glen

Worntorn asks: " I'm not sure if Jerry added the zap straps or if they are a factory item. The pickup on the installed Boyer has the wires secured in exactly the same fashion. Did Boyer add the zap straps after earlier problems?"

I have about a half dozen Boyers of various vintages and many use a zap strap to pull the wires tight against the stator plate. I am pretty sure this is stock. But it doesn't help the problem of the wire breaking between the zap strap and the connectors.

Stephen Hill

After fixing the 2 common problems with the wires, mine has run flawlessly for many years. I was even able to start mine once with a blown main battery fuse. Luckily, I was on a hill so picked up some speed before engaging the clutch to turn her over. She ran all the way home but rather upset.

With the blue can left inline its sometimes possible to kick off analog boyah with dead battery or no battery but found better to get a tow holding pu truck side till in 20's mph and then don't let rpm drop below 2000 at stops or going slow. People generally can't push it over 15ish mph through have had help from small childern that worked with just low battery. Greg Fauth is the only one I found that sells the trigger lead upgrade/repair till I gave Peel's boyah to Mike Tagilari in NY in 2005 and he's still happy with it. Black box boyah was the igniter Peel used to piss off sports pilots so have a love/hate relation and do notice its no longer boyah leading the subject lines of mysterious ignition woes. I never tried it but Jimmy Schimdt's Norton Race Manaul has a trick to get faster adv rise for better corrner exiting he claims.

The commonly available electronic ignitions for Nortons (Pazon, Boyer, Power Arc and Tri-Spark) have performance characteristics that are virtually indistinguishable for the average street rider, so what are the differences?

Pazon: The Chevy, least expensive (Sure-Fire), warranted through the manufacturer in New Zealand. 7.5 year warrantee period. Three offerings for Norton, some very expensive. Sure-Fire, Non-programmable, other offerings are programmable, magnetic trigger (Sure-fire).

Boyer: The Lexus, moderately priced (MicroDigital), warranted through your local dealer. 5 year warrantee period. Two offerings for Norton MicroDigital and MicroPower. Non-programmable, magnetic trigger.

Tri-Spark: The BMW, expensive, warranted through the manufacturer in Australia, 3 year warrantee. A single offering for Norton. Non-programmable, magnetic trigger

Power Arc: The Mercedes, expensive, warranted through the manufacturer in the USA, 6 month warrantee. A single offering for Norton. Programmable, optical trigger.

Each manufacturer claims to have the best solution, no surprises. I have used them all except for the Power Arc with very satisfactory results, but I am just a street rider (when I raced in the early '70s I had only points ignition); I am not a fan of warrantees through the manufacturer where it can take 3-4 weeks from the time you send it out until a new unit is received, fortunately these units are very reliable; solid state electronics are no longer magic. Installing these units on motorcycles with 40+ year old wiring harnesses is the root of most failures, good idea to make these installations stand-alone where you can. I very much like the Tri-sparks miniature electronic package that fits under the points cover, the Boyer is the gold standard for BMWs, Pazon's upper lever offerings give you the opportunity to program your own advance curve, Power Arc give you programmability and an optical trigger.

To the point of this thread: Boyers' are not bad at all, neither is the competition; aren't we lucky to have so many choices?

Bill.

If someone was to provide restored/upgraded mechanical AAU's there's be very little insenitive to remove the contact breaker ingition at least for those not reving out to points or valves float crank whiplash rpm. D/t Peels special concerns I'm hoeing the custom multi curves and tri sparks of Powerac will save her on pump gas.

RoadScholar said:

The commonly available electronic ignitions for Nortons (Pazon, Boyer, Power Arc and Tri-Spark) have performance characteristics that are virtually indistinguishable for the average street rider, so what are the differences?

Pazon: The Chevy, least expensive (Sure-Fire), warranted through the manufacturer in New Zealand. 7.5 year warrantee period. Three offerings for Norton, some very expensive. Sure-Fire, Non-programmable, other offerings are programmable, magnetic trigger (Sure-fire).



Bill.

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Unless Pazon has added a new product that isn't on their website, they do not offer a programmable ignition. Each ignition has a "mapped" curve. They did have a couple of curves available for their top of the line Smartfire I purchased and will make a custom curve for a fee, $400 NZ as I recall. The Smartfire does have a built in rev limiter which can easily be reset where desired.

Glen

The best ignition curve for a Commando street bike is the one provided by the oem points/AAU - all advance in by 3k RPM. The Trispark essentially duplicates that. Some of the others, the Boyer, for example, doesn't get all the advance in early enough and will give up some midrange to an oem ignition (or a Trispark). None of the electronic ignitions provide improved street performance in any way over a properly functioning oem ignition. HOWEVER, they require no maintenance and their curve/dwell time won't change due to use/wear.

Having a programmable curve is, IMO, more a marketing tool than a useful operational tool unless you use a Dyno to test/set the curve. Otherwise you are setting it using the butt-dyno which is mostly misleading/innacurate. I have seen the butt-dyno results where the butt owner swore about the obvious power increase whereas the Dyno/track showed that the opposite had occurred...

Mike said:

None of the electronic ignitions provide improved street performance in any way over a properly functioning oem ignition.

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agreed, with at least one excpetion

idle

EI's like the Trispark and the other micro digitals require less battery current and result in a more stable, consistent idle

The slower ya can get it to idle long the faster the lifter lobes go away so best wishes getting an ignition doing that well as possible. My P!! 9000 rpm 10.5 sec 1/4 miler was set by racer shop crew to idle at 600 and my Trixie came set to idle at 450 rpm both on points so put that in pipe to smoke on how good electronics bragging rights are.

Seller said P!! best time in '69 was 10.49 with a drag slick. Plugging the mass of bike and me in implies dang near 80 hp. I could not give full throttle in 4th till over 65 mph or turned into a pavement flat tracker I discovered first time I began a pass on hwy. On street tire was still at least a sec quicker than gear peddling teens on H2's triple smokers. I never hung on to top out as too scared and too much vibration but did way above the ton. No speedo on race bikes so the hwy speed was reported to me by the 1%'rs on Harleys the P!! attracted.

hobot said:

The slower ya can get it to idle long the faster the lifter lobes go away so best wishes getting an ignition doing that well as possible. My P!! 9000 rpm 10.5 sec 1/4 miler was set by racer shop crew to idle at 600 and my Trixie came set to idle at 450 rpm both on points so put that in pipe to smoke on how good electronics bragging rights are.

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Idle RPM of 450, would that result in too low an oil flow, low oil pressure? Is there any other advantage/disadvantage to this? I like having the idle up around 900-1000, for me just a bit less of a chance of stalling at a stop light, could be painful with the texting/drinking/phonetalking ---holes driving cars.

Mick F

Yep Mike ~1000 rpm is about lowest road going idle to keep some oil on lobes and some alternator juicying and mimimize stalling in traffic. Trixie Combat was stored for years and retrived from New Orleans a few weeks before hurracane flooded the river side shop but surprissingly with new fluids started right up w/o doing any tuning and found its ilde was set to 450 rpm which it held fine till battery got too low. I bumped idle up to ~1000 but wondered how/why it could ilde so low w/o hint of stalling - till got into the points system to find each breaker set on either side of 28' Combat max advance, so mechanicaly mimiced the Tri-Spark idle curve function. Slow idle is like a drug to me but like drugs its too damaging in long run to make a habit of it. Still it'd be a neat contest at rallies or video to hear who could idle the lowest. Knowing this > Iast few years on Trixie I would start and go right over 2000ish on cold starts wet sumped or not and have been pleased not to see the sump magnet fuzz I'd seen prior by babying on cold starts by 1000 ish rpm warm sump pump down, so grit teeth and give er the gun every time. I've had to open Trixie coulpe times scine doing opposite of normal wisdoms to find the lobes and lifters better burnished/polished than comnoz sent back so will continue the habit.

Peel's anagolog boyah allowed 600 rpm fine on 34 miki carb but her tiny 1.2 ah battery would only idle for a couple min before low volts over advanced boyah brain and stalled. Kind of a fail safe as couldn't idle long so didn't. Durring Peels hey day practicing flings on joy ride she could develop brain black out acceleration for instants so much it tossed the zip tied down small battery so hard it knocked fastened side cover off as it left the bike but didn't know it till comming to a stop sign and letting go throttle deid on the spot but a quick glance seeing battery wires broken and no cover solved the mystery. I never did find the missing items flung off a Mt side.

I think original AAU will be fully advanced by less than 2000rpm and I've seen two different sizes of springs. I'm planning on bushing the points cam to eliminate fifteen thou of slack and giving it another go after over 35 years with my boyer just to see if I made the right decision all those years ago.

JimC said:

johnm said:

Boyer for 15 years on a bike which is not much used.

Broken wire down at the pickup about 1000 km from new. It really was frustratingly hard to find because it only failed when hot and really needed a heavy pull to show a break with the multi meter.

Occasional nasty kick back when the battery is a bit down.

Rest is fine.

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The broken wire is the Achilles heel of the Boyer. Soldered wires subject to vibration will fracture. In the case of the Boyer pickup leads the fracture occurs inside the insulation, making it very difficult to find. Also, the misfire usually disappears above 2500 RPM. It can be a head scratcher. A lot of people have mistakenly jumped on the carbs.

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I said very frustrating because I knew this was a common cause of failure. And I checked it several times and the resistance was correct every time.

But when I really pulled it failed. To this day Im not sure if I actually broke it but I do know once it was repaired it has worked fine to this day. It was embarassing because I knew it was most likely the problem and I still couldnt find it !!!!

The only time in 36 years I couldnt get it going again on the side of the road and came home in a van !!!!!!!!!

Although I get along happily with Norton Commando points on a Vincent, I think the electronic ignitions do give some extra power.
The evidence is with Boyer, but likely the others are as good or better. There was a thread here awhile ago where racer Doug Mcrae talked about his Joe Hunt racing mag, which is a performance upgrade from points. Kenny Cummings pointed out that Doug's Joe Hunt failed at some race weekend and Doug installed Kenny's spare Boyer ignition in order to continue racing.
Doug noticed an increase in power with the Boyer, and that is above a racing mag.
Similarly, old time Westwood racer and tuner Dave Wildman switched his Triumph Triple sidecar racer from points to Boyer ignition back in the early 80s. He did this as an experiment, more to prove to those hyping the new Boyer ignition that points were best, as was his belief at the time. With the Boyer installed, he found an immediate gain of 500 rpm in top on the main straight. Since Dave was always battling with the same two or three other racers for first, the 500 rpm advantage was huge, so the points never went back in. Dave won a lot of races with that setup.

A bit about Dave Wildman for those interested:

http://canmoto.ca/dave-wildman-class-of-2010/

Glen

worntorn said:

Although I get along happily with Norton Commando points on a Vincent, I think the electronic ignitions do give some extra power.
The evidence is with Boyer, but likely the others are as good or better. There was a thread here awhile ago where racer Doug Mcrae talked about his Joe Hunt racing mag, which is a performance upgrade from points. Kenny Cummings pointed out that Doug's Joe Hunt failed at some race weekend and Doug installed Kenny's spare Boyer ignition in order to continue racing.
Doug noticed an increase in power with the Boyer, and that is above a racing mag.
Similarly, old time Westwood racer and tuner Dave Wildman switched his Triumph Triple sidecar racer from points to Boyer ignition back in the early 80s. He did this as an experiment, more to prove to those hyping the new Boyer ignition that points were best, as was his belief at the time. With the Boyer installed, he found an immediate gain of 500 rpm in top on the main straight. Since Dave was always battling with the same two or three other racers for first, the 500 rpm advantage was huge, so the points never went back in. Dave won a lot of races with that setup.

A bit about Dave Wildman for those interested:

http://canmoto.ca/dave-wildman-class-of-2010/



Glen

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Kind of lays waste to the claims of points being as good or better than IEs. I would think the reliability (Boyer pickup wire fractures not withstanding) of IEs over points alone is reason to switch to an IE. Set and forget. Now, with the empirical evidence of a power gain it's a no brainer, for me anyway.