Coil connections fouling on the tappet cover bolt

concours · Apr 24, 2012

I've tried every position, but no matter what, either the high tension lead, or the primary connections are within 1/4" of the securing nut on the tappet covers. The right worse than the left, engine offset. I have the coils pushed up, touching the reflectors... pushed all the bolt hole clearances trying to help, but still it sucks. Is this how they came from the factory? I'm looking to stay stock appearing, but this looks like a short ready happen when the engine gets jumping. What say ye? (old pic here, pre-resto, but the same scene)

Coil connections fouling on the tappet cover bolt

Stephen Hill · Apr 24, 2012

You might try loosening the two bolts that hold the coil brackets, and have someone pull up on the end of the coil while you retighten the bolts. You can often find 1/4 of an inch of clearance when you do this.

Stephen Hill
Victoria, BC

Torontonian · Apr 24, 2012

You might try addressing the real problem which is your isolastics are toast and the limiter buffers are dust.

Hobot · Apr 24, 2012

if ya got 1/4" then fairly good even with prefect isolastics. Can only move coils so far forward of fouls the reflector or frame. I got a bit more peace of mind clearance with screw on eye terminals on wires instead of the blade type. I'm glad you posted this as I was feeling like I'd missed assembled somehow for years and years.

stockie2 · Apr 25, 2012

You are not alone, I had the same problem on my 850, I gave up and removed the reflectors, It seems like they need a bracket on the reflectors to move them forward. Oh and in response the the post about ISO's being shot, I have new ones fitted.

Cheers Richard

concours · Apr 25, 2012

The iso's brand new. I've searched and read/looked, (yes, BEFORE I posted

) and conclude the MKIIA bracket was an evolution which became a somewhat mutated bodge along the way. Earlier brackets cleared well, etc. Thanks to bill and others who posted, ring terms are replacing spade lug adapters. That's close enough to original look for me.

madass140 · Apr 25, 2012

yep , have same problem, also with new isolastics

lrutt · Apr 25, 2012

I ditched the reflectors to provide enough room.

L.A.B. · Apr 25, 2012

concours said:
Is this how they came from the factory?

Well, the factory didn't pull the HT leads downwards and then loop them around to the plugs. They routed them back over the cylinder head and then down to the plugs (which also looks neatest in my opinion).

http://www.classicbike.biz/Norton/Broch ... chures.htm

The only apparent problem I could see with that arrangement was that the HT leads can rub against the edges of the steady so I slit two short pieces of fuel pipe and "clipped" them over the edges of steady plates. The piece of fuel pipe can just be seen in this photo.

Brooking 850 · Apr 25, 2012

I use spiaral wrap on the HT leads ,where they run close or contact the head steady, run the lead straight out of the coil as in the last pic and point the caps backwards not forward. 1/4 " gap between the reflectors and the base of the coils and should all fit nice
Regards Mike

303 fmj · Apr 25, 2012

I went down to my True Value and puchased 4 nylon spacers; 4 longer stainless bolts and 4 stainless nyloks.--This spaced the coils out about 1/2 inch and allowed the coils to be moved back--toward the front of the bike--about 1/2 inch. I also installed ring terminals. Plenty of room now.

concours · Apr 25, 2012

L.A.B. said:
concours said:

Is this how they came from the factory?

Click to expand...

Well, the factory didn't pull the HT leads downwards and then loop them around to the plugs. They routed them back over the cylinder head and then down to the plugs (which also looks neatest in my opinion).

http://www.classicbike.biz/Norton/Broch ... chures.htm

The only apparent problem I could see with that arrangement was that the HT leads can rub against the edges of the steady so I slit two short pieces of fuel pipe and "clipped" them over the edges of steady plates. The piece of fuel pipe can just be seen in this photo.

looks like someone along the way replaced the high tension leads with 45 degree ends, also my engine sits high.. everything that has slots, they're maxed out showing the engine high.. the head steady was 1/16" from the frame tube, the slots topped out.

concours · Apr 25, 2012

Here it shows how high, note the slots for the head steady maxed out...

the top bracket was hitting the frame

and toss in a mis-routed cable

and where I releived the top bracket to clear the frame:

Coil connections fouling on the tappet cover bolt

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