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Any way to test igniter off the bike?

  • Thread starter Thread starter GS450inOKC
  • Start date Start date
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GS450inOKC

Guest
Hello everyone,
First time here, nice forum you have. I have searched the forum and can't find this answer.
I have a 1980 GS450. She is in need of everything and now I feel it's time to part her out. Which brings up the question, how can I test the igniter when this bike has never run and has no good chance of running? The Clymer manual assumes the bike is in a good state in order to check the igniter.

Is there some way to test the igniter with a meter?

Thanks
Kent
 
Basically pull the plugs, connect them so that you can see the electrodes, put in a battery, ignition and killswitch on and turn the engine by hand and you should get a spark if all is well, otherwise do some tests as below:
I have not done this yet myself, but it seems if some tests can be done, but needs to be done on the bike.
1) Get colour wiring diagram from BassCliffs website if you do not already have.
2) With ignition on make sure you have 12 volts present over the terminals on plug of Igniter Unit with Black/White wire(Neg) and Yellow/White wire (pos) Killswitch must be on as well as this interrupts Yellow/White positive. If this is OK power is reaching unit.
3) Now check for continuity with plug off on the Blue and green wires that run to the pickup coils (Signal Generator). You should get the coil resistance of both coils in series if measuring on the resistance scale between these wires.
4) Next check that both your coils have 12v between the Yellow/White (pos) wires and the chassis or negative on battery.
5)Next check that you have continuity on both the wires Black/Yellow and White and that they are properly terminated. These two wires provide negative pulses to the coils that then generate a spark on that pulse.
6) This point I have not proven, but put a voltmeter across either the White or the Black/Yellow and Positive (Orange/White or Positive battery terminal) on the igniter plug and turn the engine with the plugs out. You should see a voltage pulse every time the pickup coil is activated. An analogue meter may show this better with needle swing.

Before doing any of this make sure that your killswitch is not malfunctioning and is actually putting out 12v Pos to the igniter and coils!!
According to the Suzuki manual the igniter uses NPN transistors and functions as an amplifier and switching device. I am sure that if it is faulty, careful removing of the encased resin with the patience of a fossil digger, you will be able to expose the components and be able to replace them if such a unit is unobtainable (not done by myself yet and stated by others as to not be too reliable, so absolute last resort)
Hope this gets you going.
 
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If your igniter is working and you wanna sell it, shoot me a PM. I need one.
 
The problem with any igniter test is that it just tells you how the darn thing works under a "low load" situation - when cool and at a low firing rate.
This is not at all conclusive. One of the most frustrating experiences I've had with bikes was as follows:
The bike would fire just fine after it was first started and ridden at low RPM. About 20 minutes into the ride the bike would start to sputter. I checked all kinds of things (hours and hours and hours...) other than the ignition components, assuming they were OK because the bike started and rode OK initially. Well, it turned out that the igniter was failing intermittently once heated up and this was even more exaggerated at high RPM where the demand on the igniter is greater. Eventually the unit failed altogether and I got no spark at all (that's when I finally realized it was the igniter that was the culprit all along).
 
Thanks for the suggestions, but I was looking for a method to test the igniter without using the bikes electrical system, as in measuring resistance between leads....I know some Kawasaki igniters can be checked this way.

It's a parts bike, the motor is frozen so I can't turn it to create a spark. Is there a way I can "fool" the pickups into producing a signal to create a spark? This is assuming the wiring harness is not compromised and can carry the voltage. I'll try and hook it into the harness with a battery. Thank goodness the ignition still had the key.

If you saw my bike you would laugh. I had an idea of building a bobber or cafe out of it, but I think I could buy one for much less than it would take to build one.

PICT0917.jpg
 
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