Frank Angerano

The sensor should be lower right side of the radiator if your sitting on the bike. As far as ignition switch is it an oem switch ?

The wires going to the fan and the sensor are circled. Test them as I indicated and see if the fan comes on. Meantime send me a pic of the wires and the area that they are located in I will see where they go on my machine.

So you got spark!! That’s great!!!! The cooling system fan will only work when the engine temp gets to its set point. On the right side of the bike the radiator bottom should have a sensor on it. There should be two wires connected to it. Take them two wires off of the sensor. When the engine is running use a jumper wire and jump the two wires. That fan should come on, if so that’s good news as far as the fan working and the power going to it. The only thing next is to see if the sensor is working. My guess is it’s working fine. My bike took a while to heat up and come on. If in doubt swap it out for a new one. I will get back to you with the wire colors for that fan and the wires your talking about that are loose.

What kind of weird noise? And smoke coming from the exhaust is mostly a valve cover leaking. Unless your valve seals are bad but you would get a lot of blue smoke from the exhaust. How far was it out of time because if it was far out then then the piston and valves could have kissed causing a bent valve condition.

Sh** happens. Look in the download section I’m sure there is one there.

Very nice! What size bike is she riding now ? That rim if you heat it up and take a small sledge hammer/lump hammer wrap it in duct tape and slowly hit it back into shape. Take your time.

Wow that’s filthy !!!! I would wash it down as best possible and start checking things out. Make sure there is oil and the fluids are good. 1. See if the engine turns by pull starter or crank. If the engine cranks then that’s a good sign. Pull the spark plug to make it easier, and spray some WD 40 into the spark plug hole. If it’s seized up then it’s a problem and the heads going to have to come off at the very least. 2. Drain the oil and inspect it for metal particles that could be from a blown crank bearing. 3. Take a compression reading (if possible) 4. Pull the carburetor off and rebuild/clean it and put it back on and see if it will fire up. (But this only applies if the motor turns) You can connect a battery and jump it If you want so you can really crank it over as well. If the previous owner said the engine is dead it could be from a blown piston or a main crank bearing or the transmission is blown. So the engine may run but the bike does not move or vice versa.

I don’t think it would advantageous to do that since the harness does not have that feature built in. The heater comes on based off of a thermostatic sensor that tells it to turn on and off. It’s manageable to do and could be done I guess but it’s prob not worth the effort especially based on where you live.

So it’s alive and well. Wrapped up the mechanical end today and she fired right up. I made a foolish mistake while rebuilding the carb. After it was running and idling great it would not throttle up! So I broke the carb down one more time thinking the beat up jets could be the problem. I found that I put the pilot jet in place of the main jet and the main jet in place of the pilot jet! 🤦🏻‍♂️. The thread is the same so it’s easy to make that mistake. Anyway I swapped it out and it runs like a champ. Very happy with the sound and condition of this machine. I know it’s only a 250 but it’s a little beast!!! Should get the plastics on tomorrow or Monday and see how it runs when it’s on the ground. After that maybe let my oldest run with it for a while or post it and move it along to the next owner!

Why is because Ricky stators are well built. They make stators that are equivalent to oem stators. You get what you pay for however I have used Caltric and have had luck. Plugged right in and worked great. Never used or ordered one for a 500 like yours but I did use one on my old Polaris Phoenix and worked without any issues. I believe you 100% when you say you know what your doing when it comes to doing this work. We always get that one problem child that will drive you bat sh** crazy!! So see this pain in the as* through and move it along. Keep us posted please and @JacobSlabach you also through me for a loop with that color thing ???

Nice work, Quadcrazy members are on fire this last week or so with some crazy projects!!!! I’m going to post some updated pics of my little Mojave project in the next few minutes. Ride safe.

Always something! Both bearings done ?

Wow just got in from working on my project bike you guys covered a lot. Great topic discussion. So I’m assuming your going to order a new stator as discussed earlier and I think that’s going to solve this erratic voltage problem. We see a lot of people asking about wiring in an aftermarket stator that does not match up like an oem part. Hopefully this will solve your problem. Nice work so far and @BuggyMasters great input!!!! Keep us posted!

That still would not make sense for the voltage to jump all over the place like that. Even if some of the magnets are gone OR the newer flywheel with the additional magnets was in place the voltage should be stable if the engine is spinning at a constant rpm like it was explained? It jumped from 18v to 22v at idle ? How could the voltage change if the rpms did not ? My money would be on a bad stator. I do however find your information on the flywheel a very interesting point.

Die grinder has become my new best friend. Wheel bearings and differential fluid/maintenance is often overlooked. That’s a lot of time spent on one side without loosing your cool though. Let’s hope the other side goes better. Good luck.

When you have the head off again try to move the crank up and down to see if there is play in the bearing. Not rotating but move up and down. Any play in that direction and it a blown main bearing. Side to side is ok.

Hmmm possibly the wrong stator. But was it running ok before all this happened ? The wires don’t match ? The plugs fit up or spliced wires?

Test your stator out put. That’s extremely high!

Great work brother, ride safe.

So it’s alive and well?

Yep seen that in the first post. I’m still sticking with my original diagnosis of a coil, wires and plugs.

Yes you have to replace that reverse cam stopper while your in there. The neutral safety switch is not really a switch. It’s just two contacts on a board. All I did was sand the surface down of the switch and replace the cam stopper. Put a sh** load of grease on the bevel gear and shaft before you reassemble. When you put the drive shaft back the four bolts, tighten them in a crisscross pattern and use a little thread lock or a dab of silicone on the nuts when they are tight. Nice work and great pics.

No worries. Most likely not the neutral safety switch. It’s the reverse cam. Read that post and you will see the contact point on the revers cam that’s spring loaded. The spring loses its bounce and the contact rod has a problem grounding the switch. Just be sure to sand the switch a bit before you reinstall. Good luck.

I’m not sure what test you performed on the cdi because I’ve never seen one testable so that’s kinda throwing me off a bit. But the coil yes you can test that.

The re wire will not work. Don’t waste your money. If your not getting a reading on the ignition coil wouldn’t you think that’s the problem ?