Big Bear 400 spark issue solved

[Doug]

Hi, I'm new to the forum but used this site extensively to solve a problem a friend had with his bike so I thought I should at least share a little problem solver I discovered.

He bought the bike knowing there was no spark. He replaced the stator and primary coil also known as pulser coil or exciter coil or rotational etc., as well as the CDI, secondary coil (the one attached to the spark plug wire) along with the wire and plug. Still no spark.

He dropped it off at my place a month ago to see if I could figure out what was wrong. I did all the recommended tests and everything was within specs. I checked all connections and switches, all okay. So everything was perfect but still no spark.

Here's the problem solver, I devised my own test and pushed "Bell wire" beside the positive and negative pins of the primary coil inside the plug of the ATV wiring harness (see below for wire identification) leading to the CDI box. I touched the wires to the ends of a "Double A" battery observing polarity. The spark plug sparked. So I knew right away everything in the ignition wiring was good and there was a problem with the primary coil. So there you go, no ohms and crap to test, you'll know right away where to look for the problem.

I pulled the stator housing and found that the primary coil (or what ever you might call it) was mounted upside down, I removed it, turned it over, remounted it and now the machine runs perfectly.

Here is some info I could not find on line regarding the primary coil:

The after market stator on this machine:

Blue with yellow stripe is positive from the primary coil

Green with white stripe is negative from the primary coil.

ATV wiring harness:

White with blue stripe is positive from the primary coil pin to CDI.

White with red stripe is negative from the primary coil pin to CDI.

I hope this information helps somebody.

[gatorchin]

Hi, I'm new to the forum but used this site extensively to solve a problem a friend had with his bike so I thought I should at least share a little problem solver I discovered.

He bought the bike knowing there was no spark. He replaced the stator and primary coil also known as pulser coil or exciter coil or rotational etc., as well as the CDI, secondary coil (the one attached to the spark plug wire) along with the wire and plug. Still no spark.

He dropped it off at my place a month ago to see if I could figure out what was wrong. I did all the recommended tests and everything was within specs. I checked all connections and switches, all okay. So everything was perfect but still no spark.

Here's the problem solver, I devised my own test and pushed "Bell wire" beside the positive and negative pins of the primary coil inside the plug of the ATV wiring harness (see below for wire identification) leading to the CDI box. I touched the wires to the ends of a "Double A" battery observing polarity. The spark plug sparked. So I knew right away everything in the ignition wiring was good and there was a problem with the primary coil. So there you go, no ohms and crap to test, you'll know right away where to look for the problem.

I pulled the stator housing and found that the primary coil (or what ever you might call it) was mounted upside down, I removed it, turned it over, remounted it and now the machine runs perfectly.

Here is some info I could not find on line regarding the primary coil:

The after market stator on this machine:

Blue with yellow stripe is positive from the primary coil

Green with white stripe is negative from the primary coil.

ATV wiring harness:

White with blue stripe is positive from the primary coil pin to CDI.

White with red stripe is negative from the primary coil pin to CDI.

I hope this information helps somebody.

glad you got your problem fixed and are up and running again..i am having a no start, no spark, (when i actually do get it to crank by jumping the solenoid) issue with my 01 wolverine..i have tried several forums but can't get any help...don't know why but i have only gotten a single response and i think that was on yfm350 forum..any way..i'm gonna try your trick and see if it can tell help me..thanks for posting and keep on keepin' on

[Doug]

Is the neutral light on when you turn the key to the run position?

Have you tested for power at the at the cdi?

Let me know what you have done and Ill see if I can help.

[gatorchin]

Is the neutral light on when you turn the key to the run position?

Have you tested for power at the at the cdi?

Let me know what you have done and Ill see if I can help.

I don't know exactly how to test for power at Cdi..I went through then connector on Cdi, using a paper clip, and one of the wires read 12 volts, I would have to do it again to remember what color wire it was...Yes when I turn key to on position, neutral light comes on, when I press start button, oil light comes on(as it should) but I get no clicks or anything..I have new battery currently at 12.7 volts...i replaced start circuit cut off relay, starter solenoid (bought cheap caltric that I am replacing, one of the small wires broke when I was trying tighten it down)...but with old and new relay, I never got 12v on the left side of solenoid when push button was pressed...I put in new key switch..my kill switch went bad, but I re wired so I could still use push button and lights and I think I got it right..(I ordered used switch from eBay but it turned out to be faulty, sending it back...I flipped the quad a while back, and went ahead and did the park brake safety bypass (unhooked white connector , and plugged in black and black and white stripe together at bullet connectors..earlier today, when that solenoid wire broke on me , while I was removing it, I disconnected the white connector for red/white and blue/white wires, put my black lead from multimeter on negative battery and read lead to pin for re/white wire on harness side, with key on I read 12.37 volts..also another cable got messed up when I flipped it, it was the clutch safety cable I believe??? But I had not had any issues with that, but I have a new clutch/park brake perch on the way just to get everything back right till I get this figures out..here are some readings I got...pickup coil 505 ohms, source coil 299 ohms, stator coil wires (all three testes 1-2, 1,3 , 2,3 I got .8 and .9 on different days, secondary coil 8.4k ohms, spark plug cap 5k ohms, ignition coil .4 ohms, all of these seem to be within specs per service manual...just got an email from a guy from Ricky stator saying to check ac at cranking from source coil, should be 80 vac...(that would be a good test if I could get it to crank!)...I cannot pull start..did get it to fire by pull start a couple of weeks ago, rode for 5 min it backfired like a cannon, then lost all power, it was still rolling and fired back up on its own, it did this 3!times before it finally slowed down enough it wouldn't start while rolling ...got it to pull start one more time, ran like crap till I got it home and hasn't started since...even if I jump solenoid I get no spark..pull start , no spark...so I need to figure my no crank out, them figure out why I'm getting no spark (new plug)

[Doug]

You have been busy.

The red wire at the CDI was power on the Big Bear but it sounds like you have power there so its good.

There will be a ground wire at the CDI plug (or plugs) (black on the Big Bear). It is from the kill switch and ignition key switch, test from the negative side on the battery to this wire in the CDI plug with ignition on and kill switch off. It should be an open circuit. when you press the kill switch or turn off the key it should be a closed circuit. This will eliminate a couple of suspects. If that checks out okay then we will have to look deeper.

Im at a loss as to why the starter will not work. If you have the body off the front of the machine unplug the tires wires from the stater switch to the starter solenoid, jump the wires and see if the starter goes.

[gatorchin]

You have been busy.

The red wire at the CDI was power on the Big Bear but it sounds like you have power there so its good.

There will be a ground wire at the CDI plug (or plugs) (black on the Big Bear). It is from the kill switch and ignition key switch, test from the negative side on the battery to this wire in the CDI plug with ignition on and kill switch off. It should be an open circuit. when you press the kill switch or turn off the key it should be a closed circuit. This will eliminate a couple of suspects. If that checks out okay then we will have to look deeper.

Im at a loss as to why the starter will not work. If you have the body off the front of the machine unplug the tires wires from the stater switch to the starter solenoid, jump the wires and see if the starter goes.

I will try the ground wire test at the cdi when I get home this evening.

But I am confused by the second part of the test for the starter...I do have all the body plastic removed...but the part about "remove the tires wires from the stater (starter? Or stator?) to the starter solenoid , jump the wires and see if the starter goes.

Could you clear this part of the test up for me?? I can tell you that if I take a jumper wire from positive battery terminal to the small blue / white stripe wire coming off the bottom of my starter solenoid, I can get it to crank...( once I do this I can get it to crank with push button, kill slide switch, I can slide to kill or to run and I believe I can turn key in either direction , on or off and it will crank!....I read on another forum to try that and it effectively bypasses all safeties...but I still get no spark when doing this., so it just drains the battery...I also took my starter apart, brushes looked good, and I clean the commutator bars and got the dark carbon off there and their shiny again, so starter is in great shape.

[gatorchin]

Ok...went out to test black wire on Cdi...first off my wire that is getting 12v is yellow/black stripe....second I tried my Cdi black wire like this, negative lead to battery, positive lead to black wire on Cdi connector...I had continuity with key on/0ff kill run or off..always closed circuit ..so I tried black/white stripe wire on Cdi connector..it was a closed circuit with kill off and key on or off..it was an open circuit with key on kill to run..remember I had rewired my kill assembly because the switch was giving me trouble...well I put all wires back to original way they were, and the wires I had plug into each other to kill the park brake safety (black into black whitenstripe, I put those back they way they originally were...pushed the start button, nothing...pulled the rope start . And bam, it fired right up!!!! I haven't heard this sound in a long time...I'm still out here messing with it, gonna see if I can get spark by jumping solenoid and a few other things..wish me luck!!

[gatorchin]

I couldn't spend much more time on it but I did try jumping the solenoid and it fired right up like that too..pull started a couple more times , fired up...my new solenoid wil be here in a couple of days and I'm crossing my fingers that it will start with push button with new solenoid..but I'm thrilled just to hear it running again...couldn't test drive it cause it is stripped down..I keep you updated on the progress..if I hadn't done the check on the black wire on the Cdi, who knows how long it would have taken me to get my wires up front back in order , so thanks

[Doug]

Glad to hear it started.

Sorry about the weird instructions regarding jumping the wires to the starter solenoid from the start button connection. for some reason I was having a problem getting text to enter properly.

Good luck.

[gatorchin]

Ok I still have my wires from push button exposed where I had spliced a couple of wires so I will try that this evening...I could have a bad push button too..I know my kill slide is not in great shape..I really need a new assembly, but I'm gonna wait till I can afford to buy a new one...unless I can find a used one that I know is good..the one I got off eBay was from a 95 model and was in worse shape than mine..but for $25 I figured I'd give t a shot, cheapest I've seen a new one was on partshark for 65 plus shipping..for now I'll just keep the kill in the run position and not mess with it

[gatorchin]

Glad to hear it started.

Sorry about the weird instructions regarding jumping the wires to the starter solenoid from the start button connection. for some reason I was having a problem getting text to enter properly.

Good luck.

Could you give me a little more detail on how to do this?...like exactly where from the start button am I putting a jumper? (I assume that's how you are telling me to do it)...am I to hook up a jumper wire to the red/white wire ( which I believe is the "power wire" ) and jump that to which part of solenoid , the left side ? Big terminal? Or one of the small wires??..I guess it could be possible I could have dirty contacts in the push button..I took one apart one time and that spring what a bear to get back right... Anyway if I can't get this figured out, I would be interested in installing a separate toggle type start switch if I don't get this figured out before winter..I ran it all day after installing the new solenoid ( another cheapie hope that ain't the problem)..pull started every time, but nothing but the oil light with push button.. No clicks at solenoid or anything

[Chelsy Webb]

I have a 02 400 big bear. It will run great if you pull start by rope or jump it. The problem is it won't start off button. It has spark at plug, cdi box has juice, I noticed I get no nuetral light either when I turn key over. Someone help me figure out why my quad won't start off button

[davefrombc]

I would suspect  the  neutral  safety switch is  faulty. If  it  fails open  it will  not allow the  starter  to  run.

[Jon Colasono]

I have a 99 big bear 350. That would stop sparking when hot but would run like a champ beforehand. Put on new pick up coil, ignition coil and i have a new source coil to put on if only i could remove stator which i cant figure out how to get off is there a special tool i remove all screws 3 philips. Inside and 3 star out side but wont budge dont want to pry too much and mess up stator pleasr help

[SteveD]

On 2013-09-10 at 3:32 PM, Doug said:

Hi, I'm new to the forum but used this site extensively to solve a problem a friend had with his bike so I thought I should at least share a little problem solver I discovered.

He bought the bike knowing there was no spark. He replaced the stator and primary coil also known as pulser coil or exciter coil or rotational etc., as well as the CDI, secondary coil (the one attached to the spark plug wire) along with the wire and plug. Still no spark.

He dropped it off at my place a month ago to see if I could figure out what was wrong. I did all the recommended tests and everything was within specs. I checked all connections and switches, all okay. So everything was perfect but still no spark.

Here's the problem solver, I devised my own test and pushed "Bell wire" beside the positive and negative pins of the primary coil inside the plug of the ATV wiring harness (see below for wire identification) leading to the CDI box. I touched the wires to the ends of a "Double A" battery observing polarity. The spark plug sparked. So I knew right away everything in the ignition wiring was good and there was a problem with the primary coil. So there you go, no ohms and crap to test, you'll know right away where to look for the problem.

I pulled the stator housing and found that the primary coil (or what ever you might call it) was mounted upside down, I removed it, turned it over, remounted it and now the machine runs perfectly.

Here is some info I could not find on line regarding the primary coil:

The after market stator on this machine:

Blue with yellow stripe is positive from the primary coil

Green with white stripe is negative from the primary coil.

ATV wiring harness:

White with blue stripe is positive from the primary coil pin to CDI.

White with red stripe is negative from the primary coil pin to CDI.

I hope this information helps somebody.

Doug, I did the Double A battery truck with the wire, I got spark but when I pull my stator cover off everything looks good. 2 brand new stator and pulser coils and still no spark when I hook it back up.. brand new cdi box as well. Please help me. Machine is a 2000 Yamaha kodiak 400

[Colasonojon9]

On 9/10/2013 at 2:32 PM, Doug said:

Hi, I'm new to the forum but used this site extensively to solve a problem a friend had with his bike so I thought I should at least share a little problem solver I discovered.

He bought the bike knowing there was no spark. He replaced the stator and primary coil also known as pulser coil or exciter coil or rotational etc., as well as the CDI, secondary coil (the one attached to the spark plug wire) along with the wire and plug. Still no spark.

He dropped it off at my place a month ago to see if I could figure out what was wrong. I did all the recommended tests and everything was within specs. I checked all connections and switches, all okay. So everything was perfect but still no spark.

Here's the problem solver, I devised my own test and pushed "Bell wire" beside the positive and negative pins of the primary coil inside the plug of the ATV wiring harness (see below for wire identification) leading to the CDI box. I touched the wires to the ends of a "Double A" battery observing polarity. The spark plug sparked. So I knew right away everything in the ignition wiring was good and there was a problem with the primary coil. So there you go, no ohms and crap to test, you'll know right away where to look for the problem.

I pulled the stator housing and found that the primary coil (or what ever you might call it) was mounted upside down, I removed it, turned it over, remounted it and now the machine runs perfectly.

Here is some info I could not find on line regarding the primary coil:

The after market stator on this machine:

Blue with yellow stripe is positive from the primary coil

Green with white stripe is negative from the primary coil.

ATV wiring harness:

White with blue stripe is positive from the primary coil pin to CDI.

White with red stripe is negative from the primary coil pin to CDI.

I hope this information helps somebody.

I tried this on my 99 big bear 350 2wd and no spark but my wire colors are different  I have white wire green stripe, white wire pink stripe maybe red, brown wire white stripe and green wire to CDI for pickup coil and Source coil

[SteveD]

On 2017-12-30 at 9:46 PM, SteveD said:

Doug, I did the Double A battery trick with the wire, I got spark but when I pull my stator cover off everything looks good. 2 brand new stator and pulser coils and still no spark when I hook it back up.. brand new cdi box as well. Please help me. Machine is a 2000 Yamaha kodiak 400. 

 

[Doug]

Hi Steve. It's been a while since I have had to work on one but you get a spark so you should be able to trace back to see where the break is. Could be a broken wire or even a faulty neutral switch or ignition switch. Sorry I can't be of more help but I don't have one here to retrace the wires for you.

[Fullsizechevy9]

I am having an issue with my 07 big bear when i hook up the ignition coil i keep blowing the 10amp fuse looked for shorts and cant find any. It also will not turn over the start button is working i tested it i put a new solenoid i have 1 hot and 2 grounds going into solenoid plug is this right?