No resistance

[rangerguy302]

What would happen if there were non resistor caps installed with factory coils? Mine are running 9-12ohm..... That might explain a thing or 3...lol Any ideas?

[3Phase]

Absolutely nothing will happen without the resistors in the caps.

Some resistance in the secondary circuit is useful and it doesn't really matter if it's at the coil secondary terminal, a resistor wire, a resistor spark plug cap, or a resistor inside the spark plug. The resistors are there to reduce the RF energy broadcast by the spark plugs and to smooth the spark voltage and slightly extend the spark duration.

Without the resistors the spark plugs will broadcast more RF energy and the spark voltage will be peaky with slightly less duration. The shorter but slightly more energetic spark current will also erode the spark plug electrode and ground strap a little faster so you will have to sharpen the spark plugs and reset the gaps more often or just buy new ones.

You will never be able to notice that nothing is happening unless you have some incredibly expensive engine tuning and monitoring equipment or someone in the general vicinity has an AM radio receiver/transmitter.

[ViperRon]

All 3Phase said is true and also high resistance in the plug cap only identifies there may be an issue not how bad it really is. Usually resistance in the caps is caused by rust or corrosion. This can cause a gap that the spark has to travel across and as it arcs can cause more issue until spark is entirely lost. You can take some of the NKG caps apart clean them and they will work just like new.

Issue with caps is not abnormal as they deal with a great deal of heat and cooling which can cause condensation inside. Typically the design of the NKG caps is a spring which keeps the resister pushed tight against the contacts inside. Even the tiny airspace in the spring area causes condensation from being heated and cooled and soon can rust the spring. The issue with the rust is with heat everything changes at times it can have the effect of reducing resistance however typically it increases resistance and if it arcs and burns can stop any spark from getting threw

[rangerguy302]

Ya the spark seems really weak, it's just a tiny blue snap. I even gave it the good ol fashion lick your finger and grab it test, and it didn't put out enough to make me let go.... Figured that might be the cause of high rpm stumble bad milage and lots of black soot in the exhaust. Going to clean up everything today and check the results. Any other advice is great, thanks again guys. O.....has anyone talked to Andreas? Been trying to contact him but no reply. Need to set up to collect a parts lot from him

[dbeardslee]

Ya the spark seems really weak, it's just a tiny blue snap. I even gave it the good ol fashion lick your finger and grab it test, and it didn't put out enough to make me let go.... Figured that might be the cause of high rpm stumble bad milage and lots of black soot in the exhaust. Going to clean up everything today and check the results. Any other advice is great, thanks again guys. O.....has anyone talked to Andreas? Been trying to contact him but no reply. Need to set up to collect a parts lot from him

If you're running stock coils, then you're also running 35+ year old high tension wires. Those old wires are notorious for cracking, and you have the potential for electricity to arc from the wires to the motor. Get the bike in a relatively dark place, mist the wires with water, and see if you see any blue sparks arcing from the wires to the motor.

When I removed the old coils from Betsy, I decided to keep them so I stuck them in a coffee can. When I coiled the wires to get them into the can, a couple of them snapped right in two.

You can graft new wires into old coils, but you still wind up with 15KV coils. Personally I'm an advocate of replacing them with 30KV Dynas. You'll get a much hotter spark, faster starts, and better throttle response. JAT