ZL600 Ignition problem

[NorthOfDallas]

Howdy all!
I'm new here trying to help a friend with his '86 ZL600. i'm a long time KZ owner and know the Kaw's pretty well, but this one's got me stumped a bit. Here's the rundown:
86 ZL600
K&N Pods
unbaffled stock exh
Jetted with 125's
Accel Coils and 8mm wires
Creemed tank with inline fuel filter


I just pulled the carbs (dreaded leaking #4) cleaned, checked floats, synched and reinstalled. I also lubed the cables an cleaned up the routing of hoses and such.

When cool to warming, it runs EXCELLENT. Once sufficiently warmed, it exhibits behaviors of a lean condition: bog, snap, pop, no power, but upon further inspection I found that the neither coil is firing from about 2500 to 4500rpm, and sporadically after about 5k.

I am at a loss as to why this could be on both coils, unless they've both failed at the same time; which is possible but unlikely. Can someone direct me? Could it be Hall Sensor, CDI box, coils themselves, Flux Capacitor?

Thanks in advance!
Corey

PS: while I have a Yammy now, do I get acceptance if it has Dale Walker Holeshot Stage 1 kit in it? :)

[zlMark]

Welcome Corey!

Have a real good look at the wires! I had a similiar problem in the same rpm area.

[NorthOfDallas]

Welcome Corey!

Have a real good look at the wires! I had a similiar problem in the same rpm area.

please elaborate...what am I looking for?

[zlMark]

Sorry, spark plug wires! I'm not sure if they are just like the ZL900/ZL1000. If they are there is a resister cap that screws on to the end of the plug wires and the wires themselves get pushed over a pin at the coil and held in place with a compression connector. What happens over time is the inner copper core of the wire gets burnt back inside and won't make good connection under heavy engine load. The cure is to nip 1/4" off each end of the wires so they make good connection again. Sometimes this won't work if the wires are too short. I used automotive 7mm stranded copper core wire to replace mine. You can buy it in bulk by the foot or buy a car kit(Accell#3008) and cut of the car boots as you can't use them.
Try cleaning the side stand switch also by pulling the boot back and give it a shot of WD40. Work the plunger real good.

And of course ask if you need more info and let us know the fix!

[mblackwell]

I had the popping intermittent miss w/ good running when warming up etc. Went through all the carb rebuild/spark plug wire/coil replace/tank clean/switch-grounds-connection clean etc. Finally found through process of elimination that CDI box was partially fried. 1000 miles on the the $50.00 fleabay box and no problems. I don't know if there is a way to test the CDI box (there must be), but my old one had some slight scorch marks or carbon tracks. The previous owner said the folks he bought it from may have jumped it off and run it on a dead battery. Supposed to be very bad for the CDI box. This all in the realm of hearsay so others with more knowledge than me, feel free to chime in.

[NorthOfDallas]

I think i've got it but I have a few concerns that I want to share:

The pickup coils are at 454 ohms (just outside of spec at 360-440 ohms - but that could be the meter if you account for age)
I’m concerned that the coils may be the wrong PN; but I have conflicting information from Accel. For CDI ignitions, Accel recommends the 140404, for inductive and points: 140403 (which is on the bike), but their cross-reference says that 140403 is for the 1985 ZX600…
Will the CDI can get damaged if the wrong coils are used (theoretically the 140403), even though the ’85 ZX600 uses the same CDI?
The Accel coils measured 3.8 ohms. The book says stock is 1.8-2.8 ohms. Is this case for any red flags?




I did the test in the manual and it appears to be the ignitor (the whole top row of contacts (1-5) are all showing infinity), but I want confirmation based on the above, if y'all don't mind lending a little more assistance.

The more I learn, the less I seem to know...

Thanks again!

[zlMark]

More OHMS= more resistance. It should be ok to run with more resistance because you aren't frying out the CDI from too much current flow, in your case it would be too little.
That ignitor test is very tricky to follow, make sure you are on the right scale for each test.

[kawboy]

More OHMS= more resistance. It should be ok to run with more resistance because you aren't frying out the CDI from too much current flow, in your case it would be too little.
That ignitor test is very tricky to follow, make sure you are on the right scale for each test.

I wouldn't think that small difference would matter.

As Mark stated, make sure you're on the right scale testing the igniter. You won't get the exact readings in the manual unless you have the Kawasaki tester. Also, use sharp pointed probes to ensure you're piercing any corrosion on the connections, or use a wire brush to clean it up.

[NorthOfDallas]

More OHMS= more resistance. It should be ok to run with more resistance because you aren't frying out the CDI from too much current flow, in your case it would be too little.
That ignitor test is very tricky to follow, make sure you are on the right scale for each test.

Thanks for the speedy response Mark. I had felt confident that I tested it properly. I used two meters, one autoranging, the other set what I thought was properly. Just now I grabbed my trusty pocket digital Radioshack and sure enough, it gave me far more consistent results across the board. In all tests, pins 4 and 5 going in both polarities are dead (open lead). The rest was in spec.

So to be clear on what you are saying is that the slightly out of spec pickup coils are okay, the Accel coils are okay and based on my testing the CDI is the culprit?


one thing I hadn't checked, is that I did all of my testing cold, but the issues come about when the bike is warm. I will repeat my test as soon as the bike exhibits its poor behavior to confirm.

[NorthOfDallas]

Hey KawBoy, where are you in TX?

[kawboy]

Hey KawBoy, where are you in TX?

Hey NorthOfDallas - I'm a world away from you - SouthOfHouston :laughing7:

[NorthOfDallas]

Hey NorthOfDallas - I'm a world away from you - SouthOfHouston :laughing7:

I was just in Baytown, LaMarque, League and Galveston last week on vacation. Had I known you were there....I'd have WARNED YA!!!! :):rotf:

[kawboy]

I was just in Baytown, LaMarque, League and Galveston last week on vacation. Had I known you were there....I'd have WARNED YA!!!! :):rotf:

Galveston's nice, though I haven't been since hurricane Ike.

But LaMarque, League City, Baytown? on vacation? :icon_scratch:

[NorthOfDallas]

Galveston's nice, though I haven't been since hurricane Ike.

But LaMarque, League City, Baytown? on vacation? :icon_scratch:

not to derail too far:
Fri 6/5: Baytown because we were hitting town late and wanted to go straight to the USS Texas and the Soace Center in the morning and the lodging was far cheaper than in League/LeMarque

Sat 6/6: Saving money by staying in LeMarque so we can spend Sun Nite in the Hilton on Seawall and because we were having dinner with a friend from League in Kemah and didn't want to drive too far that late.

It actually worked out even better than I thought because our schedule was booked solid all week last week.

[mstan99999]

Hey!!!!!
Back on track here!!!
You two can play patty fingers when my bike is going again!!!!!

JUST KIDDING!!!!!
Corey, I can't thank you enough for helping me out on this.
Guys....Thanks for all the input!!!!
Matt

[zlMark]

Welcome Matt!

[NorthOfDallas]

Hey!!!!!
Back on track here!!!
You two can play patty fingers when my bike is going again!!!!!

Matt[/SIZE][/COLOR][/SIZE]

That's patty-cake, fool

[NorthOfDallas]

installed CDI tested bad...new CDI fixed her like a champ. Thanks everyone for the input! I need to test more thoroughly, but it has yet to go 5 miles without an issue since Matt's owned her.

[mblackwell]

Corey,

Glad you fixed it! And glad I could finally be of some help. I have over 1000 miles on my "new" used CDI and no problems. It seems most everyone (myself included) assumes carbs/vacuum leaks first then ignition. Prolly based on good old experience, of which i have little. I am of the swap and try (most likely suspect or cheapest/easiest to replace) school of mechanics which has served me well on cars but doesn't work out quite so well with bikes. Hence it took me several months of on and off fidling and waiting for the right part on ebay etc. to find the problem. What I was wondering is there a link here to testing the CDI? I would like to test my old one and perhaps disassemble it to see if there are any obvious faults. New ones from KAW are at least $400. Also do you have any evidence that your bike was ever run with a bad or dead battery? Once again good to see another zl600 back on the road. Thanks

Mike

[NorthOfDallas]

The ZL600 manual has a chart to test each pin in a particular order with an VOM meter. I simply printed a copy and did check marks or x's for in/out of spec. In both axis'ses' (sp? :rotf: ), the pins 4 and 5 were clearly not dead as evidenced with open circuits. If you need more clarity, PM me and Iwill check it when I get home to send you something.

As far as ran with a dead battery, I have no idea.

[NorthOfDallas]

Thread resurrection time!

I'm now commuting on Matt's ZL and its definitely got an ignition problem. As a reminder from the past:


86 ZL600
K&N Pods
unbaffled stock exh
Jetted with 125's
Accel Coils and 8mm wires
less than 200 miles on the replaced CDI mentioned earlier in this thread


Add to that, freshly cleaned carbs, synced, valves adjusted and a replacement gas tank as the last one got a little holey.

It runs great for about 20 minutes, but as the bike's and the ambient temps rise, a miss starts to happen around 3-6k. If I'm cruising at part throttle in 3rd at 45mph, it'll start popping through the exhaust and is clearly down on power. When this situation is in full-swing, it takes more throttle to get it off the line and sounds different. I've read in other threads about resistor caps, pickup coils and other things, but I want to bounce this thing at y'all before I start throwing more money at it.

Thanks again!
Corey


PS: its now Matte Black (and awaiting a new seat cover once the mechanicals are straightened out)
1038710386

[rammy1500]

I thought there was another thread on the 600 CDI issue, there has been a 600 for sale in Columbus for 2 years now because of that same issue. I thought I remembered it had to do where it was mounted and caused shorting and such.

[NorthOfDallas]

I thought there was another thread on the 600 CDI issue, there has been a 600 for sale in Columbus for 2 years now because of that same issue. I thought I remembered it had to do where it was mounted and caused shorting and such.

I have looked through a number of threads and each had a different suggestion so I am not sure of the one you are talking about. If you find it, can you post up a link to that thread? Thanks!

[NorthOfDallas]

oh, one more thing, when the bike starts acting up, the tach bounces like crazy all over the place. The tach usually bounces around 3-6k RPM. I dont know if that's telling of anything.

[rammy1500]

Here is the thread:

Zl600 ignition cuts out - opinions?? (http://www.zl-oa.com/forums/showthread.php?12752-Zl600-ignition-cuts-out-opinions/page5)

http://www.zl-oa.com/forums/showthread.php?12752-Zl600-ignition-cuts-out-opinions&highlight=zl600+ignition

In case the link doesn't work.

[NorthOfDallas]

Thank you Rammy. I just went and checked and my boots are the rubber automotive style that are come from Accel (I have Accel Dynacoils). I have a partsbike so I have an extra CDI. I may dig into the bad one to see if I can fix it ...but I'm not sure I have the time right now.

[NorthOfDallas]

I have a parts bike that appeared to have a good CDI, so I swapped it in and it cured the problem. IS there anyting I can do to ensure I don't kill this ignitor? Thanks again, folks!