More of the strange and unexplained

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Darrell
Posts: 315
Joined: Mon Jul 29, 2013 7:09 am
Location: Vancouver Island, BC

More of the strange and unexplained

Post by Darrell »

My Hodaka Wombat points are another strange case for the Hodaka think to roll over.

What has happens (with TWO sets of point so far :shock: ) is that the contact point in the pivot arm starts loosening in its mount until the gap stays completely closed.

Functionally -- or dysfunctionally more aptly -- as this failure worsens the timing becomes more and more retarded, and as the point gap is also narrowing the spark gets weaker --until the bike stops firing at all.

You can see in the photo that the upper contact is loose to the extent that it has about .020" of extra float in the arm, which is more than enough to close the preset .012" gap. Any breaker action from the points in this condition would be from random vibrations from rattling around in the pivot mount.

The most recent failure occurred last weekend on a 100-mile trail ride, fortunately the bike kept running enough to get back to civilization. For some reason the bike ran better with the headlight turned off. Actually, at idle turning on the headlight shut off the engine like it was a kill switch. In hindsight I suppose I could have worked in some tree pitch onto the contact mount to temporarily stabilize the situation.

As you can see in the next photo I've since soldered the contact solidly in place and now the bike runs great again. Headlight's shining bright at all revs too.

Does anybody have an explanation for this mystery? Incidentally, I also own a 250SL that has a bad and incorrigible habit of shearing counter shafts. That is also on me and me alone so it seems. :?
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MTrat
Posts: 306
Joined: Fri Feb 12, 2016 5:00 pm
Location: Montana

Re: More of the strange and unexplained

Post by MTrat »

If the cam lobe in the flywheel is not very smooth it will wear down the rubbing block on the points until the points will not open. Polish and lightly lube the cam lobe. I've never seen points fail in the way you have shown, but we learn something new every day.
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Dale
Posts: 1271
Joined: Fri Jul 19, 2013 7:23 am

Re: More of the strange and unexplained

Post by Dale »

Darrell, I have experienced the same symptom on a Wombat. When I would turn the key to the 2nd notch for lights it would totally crap out. I didn't really try to isolate the cause as I changed out the points and condenser and the issue was resolved. I just logged it up to one more thing that didn't make sense.
Dale
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