Troubles getting over 7k rpm
 

Hello Folks,

I would like to call upon the expertise of the most mechanically inclined and get their 2 cents on the following issue:

I have a superhawk (duh) with dynojet level 1 and erion exhaust. Everything was working fine so far until I blew up my regulator last week (sounds familiar) As a side note it was my 3rd one. the oem fried soon after I bought the bike. I replaced it with an electrex that lasted 5 months, got a full refund from the company. I them moved on to a ricks something. Before mounting the latter I rewired the circuit from the regulator with bigger gauge cables, soldered connectors and added a voltmeter for good measure.
This left me in peace for a year and half of almost daily use.

So back to the main story, that last regulator fried last week, I thought I'd give a shot to a R6 regulator, mounted it, recharged the battery and was back in business.
the only thing is since then my bike stutters above 7000 rpm, just as if fuel was not flowing in. If I insist the bikes gets to 8k rpm but the stuttering increases and the bike won't rev any higher up.

Any thoughts ?

Thanks

I doubt it has to do with your latest R/r swap, and more to do with your last R/r failure. When my last R/r failed it wiped my battery out and a month or two later both my coils died a slow death. This manifested itself by dropping one cylinder when ever I tried to accelerate faster than your average car.

So I would test your coils, if you have a multimeter it is very easy. There are two circuits to test on them though, you will need to test both circuits. If they read out of spec they need to be replaced.

That makes a lot of sense. I must admit I had scoped the coils out not seeing how the rectifier failure could have affected them. That said, the behavior I experience feels like it could come from some misfiring for lack of a better term.
I shall follow your advice, test my coils (I do have a multimeter) and report back.

Thanks again for your excellent hindsight

It does sound like a coil problem. I do have a set of know good coils (they are old but still work fine) and I'm in the East Bay so if you would like to come by sometime and swap them in to see if the problem goes away, just let me know. :thumbsup:

Awesome, thanks for the kind offer. I'll foster my electric skills and test mine first and then I might very well take you up on you offer. I am in San Mateo and work in San Jose

Let me know if you get stuck or want to try them out as I'm just a quick hop over the 92. If nothing else it will be a way to make sure they are the problem and I have a good hook up on Honda parts so I can save you some $$ if you order new ones :)

Swapping them out is the best test, Springbubba let me do that with his coils and it fixed it right away. Nothing like the confidence of buying a part you know 100% is the problem. I hate buying a new part that I was sure was going to fix my bike to find out it didn't :mad:.

I was just looking for an excuse to play with my multimeter :)
8541 hawk could you sent me a pm with your contact info? I might just swing by your place on my way back from home tonight if that works for you

Thanks again for the awesome help

PM sent

just wanted to say a huge thanks for 8541Hawk for lending me a set of coils. this is community spirit at its best. In the same day I get a diagnostic from ConanDP and parts loan to troubleshoot my problem from 8541Hawk Huge :thumbsup:.

I'll keep you guys posted after I had a chance to install the coils

No worries and good to meet you :D

So did you get a chance to try the different coils and did it make any difference??

Hello, so I finally found the time to mount the coils this week-end and went for a test ride today. Sadly I must report that the bike behavior hasn't changed a notch, still the same stuttering around 6500rpm.
I think replacing the coils covered the most likely electric related problem so I am now tempted to explore fuel related issues. I would not be surprised if one of the multiple caps used to plug the ex smog system was leaking or if one carburetor vent was clogged.

I will post an update as soon as I have one. In the meanwhile fire away any suggestion you may have.

Thanks again for all the kind support

Sorry to hear that they didn't work but glad that they could be ruled out without the expense of buying new ones. If you want, you can always stop by and we can pull the carbs as I've had mine out many times

A huge thanks once again for letting me used your coils for troubleshooting. I now know that I need to look somewhere else.
I have taken my carbs out a few times so I am confident I can at least go through a first basic round of verification on my own but I will definitely take you up on your kind offer if I fail to identify the root cause of my problem
Thanks again

Check the petcock first.. Much easier to fix than a carb problem.

Could be a torn diaphragm, or a leaky or misplaced vacuum line (search for PVLIR) or just gunk in it gumming it up. All much easier to deal with than carbs.

sounds like my bike a little bit. It would get to 6-7g and start sputterig like fuel problem so i tryed petcock, fuel strainer, carb cleaning, and swaped ign coils and nada. and after months of looking (and spending 300 bucks) it turns out it was the kickstand switch... extremely weird but that was it... check it out.

Lazn and 98-Hawk, thanks for the good suggestions. I read Lazn post first so I went in and checked the following:
- petcock: vacuum line, diaphragm, petcock itself --> nada
- carburetor diaphragms: the behavior really reminded of a problem I had in the past with a torn slider diaphragm, unfortunately the diaphragms were fine here.
- spark plugs caps: good contact --> nada
- miscellaneous carb vents, plugs and caps --> nada

So I will test 98-hawk suggestion tomorrow morning.

Interestingly enough the sputtering started to happen around 5k rpm today suggesting that whatever causes the problem is getting worse.

I'll keep you guy posted. Once again folks, a big thanks for the support :)

Folks, I am very excited to report that my problem is now fixed.

Before getting to the side stand switch, I thought I would fix the clutch switch. I have a radial master clutch cylinder on my bike and as a result could not connect the clutch switch.
To avoid any possible malfunction I soldered the two cables together. By miracle, the next day, it felt like my 7k rpm problem had getting better. That confirmed the electric problem trail was the right one.

I enthusiastically shifted the focus of my soldering iron to the side stand switch and shortcuted the two cables responsible from cutting the ignition (red/white and brown if I recall properly). This allows the dashboard light to still function without any effect on the ignition.
Ang guess what? Gone the stuttering problem !

I owe a huge thank to 8541Hawk for his kind help
And another thanks to 98-hawk for suggesting to check something I would have never thought about otherwise :)

BTW I still have 8541 extra set of coils. I will gladly return them or make them available to any other forum member who needs them for troubleshooting

Glad to hear you got the problem sorted out. As for the coils, You can just bring them back by when you have a chance.

Cheers,
Mike

Wow, you learn something new every day.. side stand switch.. huh.

Glad youre up and running again!!! (running good anyway)
Yeah crazy! One day i had the bike warming up hoped on shifted into gear and it died ... Checked the side stand and it was up restarted it and drove away. Then a couple days later it did the same thing accept that time it kept dying everytime i put it intogear, so thats what got me to the point of checking the kickstand switch and bingo!!! it was soooooooo nice having full power again!!! I HATE electrical problems!

Yep, After having a restricted bike for 2 weeks it sure feels very nice to have full power again. Thanks again for the tip

I don't even get up to those RPMs, I usually shift before 6.

Umm could you contact me sometime so I can get my coils back???
Thanks

Sorry for the silence. I broke my collarbone a couple of weeks ago and it kinda screw up my schedule :( I can mail them to you if that's more convenient. Just let me know

Sorry to hear about your mishap and heal up quick. You can mail them if you want or just swing them by sometime if you are out this way, whatever works best for you. I'll Pm you my address.
Cheers,
Mike