Secondary wire test

[oldnortonrider]

I should know the answer to this, but I guess I don't. (?)Do the primary wires need to be disconnected from the coils, to get a resistance reading on the secondary wires?

[dbeardslee]

Nope. They should be tested with the caps removed, however. You just pull the caps, put one probe on each of the high tension wires from a given coil and take the reading.

[oldnortonrider]

ok,...........but can be checked with caps on,...........just different reading; right? Reason, being, all caps I've got are for "7mm" wires, and the wires I've got on, right now, are "8mm", and are really, really, hard to get together with the caps. I GET NO READING WITH MY MULTI-METER, on either set of these wires. nada. Caps on; although they're comin' off tomorrow. Got some 7mm wires~~solid core.

You may remember this posting http://www.xs11.com/forum/showthread...630#post219630 that I put on here, 4th of this month. post no. 32.

Sometimes, this beast runs perfect. Usually, when it warms up (lately)~~it don't run "so perfect". And when I do a visual on my spark, it just doesn't look "sparkey" enough. Some mystery about those suppression/graphite core wires. When I first installed them with the new MikesXS coils, I got a good reading on the high tension secondary wires. And it ran great. that wuz then.
As mentioned, I'm replacing them, but was trying to get a bit of education from this .....................

[randy]

Dump the graphite wires, get copper core wires.

[dbeardslee]

Old - You can test them with the caps on but expect the readings to be 25k ohms if you have resistor caps. If you're not getting any reading with the caps on it could be an indication of the problem. I defer to Randy on the graphite wires - he's a better electrical guru than I am. I use 7mm automotive wires on mine, but they're solid core. I use them cause I can get a set for a four-banger cage that gives me enough wire to do them 2 1/2 times for $12. I think the cores are aluminum as they are awfully shiny, but they work fine.

[oldnortonrider]

Reporting in ~~ ; been running the new 7mm solid core (copper) wires, now since last posting. They work fine; it runs and starts perfect. The visible spark, checking it on one of the sparkplugs ~~ did look "much" healthier. I knew by looking at the spark, this wuz certainly gonna be the cure. It was. I'm really fairly relieved that the nightmare electrical problem being caused by the suppression graphite core wires, didn't 'back up', and do some damage to my MikesXS coils or the TCI.

I had a brother, now gone on to Parilla and Zundapp heaven, that many years back, had the same problem with a Toyota Land Cruiser, when he was changing the plug wires. When he got it to go right, with proper wires, he told me about it~~he didn't really unnerstan' what was goin' on, and I didn't either. I guess I understand, now, what he was dealing with.