Hi all !

1st post, thanks for all being here & sharing wisdom, much appreciated. Im in Seattle Washington, I've got a 1984 XT600 kick start. I picked it up from a neighbor who'd had it for the almost 30 yrs, sat in his garage for the last at least 20.

It caught my attention as he was trailering it down the alley to deal with getting it running so he could sell it, I noticed it had the exact same engine architecture as my 86 Yamaha SRX which is a pretty unusual bike so of course I had to buy it !

Well, long story shortened, after much cleaning of tank , carb, petcock, brakes, etc... I got it running, seemed to be doing ok but went back to it after a month & it'll only fire on its initial few kicks then its dead - no start.

When I first noticed a problem I was running thru the neighborhood, gone a few blocks then it lost power & died, able to restart & limp home then die.

went thru the Factory XT manual electrics flowchart & checked as suggested all components - the ig. coil - looked a little out of spec - replaced it, no difference. The Stator source & pickup coil resistance tests are as per the book ohm's so I bought a new CDI unit off ebay from a guy in Denmark, nice looking unit but no difference with that installed either. he's suggested its the stator, this is his message back to me:
" hello - this will be sure your stator winding !! is a very common problem !!
Just measuring does not mean that it is good!!

This CDI does not need a regulator or voltage to spark!! only the stator/pickup
willy"

Ebays translating dutch so its a little off I think but Im not sure what he means I should be checking.

Bottom line, it fires on initial kick or 3 then wont fire off anymore. Was thinking fuel issue prior to CDI unit so pulled carb again & its fine. W/new CDI unit it does exactly the same thing as OE CDI unit installed. New unit however doesnt light the neutral light in the gauge cluster as the OE CDI did.

Im open to any & all suggestions, am I missing something on testing the stator?
Or is it some other issue I should be looking at?

Thanks! Evan

CDI unit from Ebay link
[URL="https://www.ebay.com/itm/331083815173"]

hi
have no experience with older/cdi/kick only xts, so the straightforwardness of my question/suggestion might be more understandable - how is the spark itself? is it strong enough (visible in daylight as well) when being tested outside the engine?

inside the stator there is the "power coil", thats what charges the CDI in order to spark, then there is the pickup sensor/coil that triggers


the "power coil" can fail, spcially once it gets warm.



coming out from the stator you should see 3 white wird, these are for the 12V sys. there should be another pari of wirs, not sure the color, which are the power coil


evn if it tsts ok, it can give trouoble once warm its the one in the left of pic

Hey !

N67 - spark in plug when pulled & laying atop engine is white-ish. Not blue but enough to initially fire engine briefly but not long -1/2 a second or so.

TG - I dont see a pic, is it of the stator wires exiting the case? one plug has 3 wires & the other 2, both sets ohm-ed out at spec as per the OE manual, thats whats confusing....but according to the Belgium CDI dude its possible their wrong & can still be failing....

dont know the test for that.

I assume the power coil is what your referring to as the source coil (2 wire, brown & red). it tested @ 200 ohm as per factory spec. - 3 wire is the pickup coil (2 whites & a black I think) , it tested 110 ohm.

I've been looking around for a stator & theyre hard to locate - anyone have any ideas?
can one just replace the source coil?

thanks!

yes, the power coil is the brown and red, and like i said, it can test ok, but start shorting when warm.... not easy to diagnose, but your symptoms hint at that, but hard to be 100% sure



not many people here are from the USA, so cant really help with shops, but maybe you can search locally for "motorcycle stator rewinding" to redo the power coil.



try talking with rickystator.com, but there are other shops too



or try find in ebay a stator, just make sure it is not form a later model that doesnt have the power coil thing


another thing to check is if stators from the yamaha 600-660 quads fit, those quads were VERY popular in the states

thanks Turbo - good point on the Quad stator. My SRX reg/rectifier failed some time back, took a bit to get to the diagnosis of that but ordered some cheap Chinese one - looked EXACTLY the same as OE one - & of course didn't work. I ended up buying a used reg/rec off ebay that came off a Yamaha snowmobile & it worked great!

I'll check it out - thanks!

Evan