jeffg

Just want to introduce myself. My name is Jeff, and I'm a bike nut. Whoops, wrong forum...this isn't motorcycles anonymous. LOL Anyway, last week I picked up a 1983 Venture for $200.00 (payable in shots of Southern Comfort at my local American Legion) The bike hasn't been treated well for the past 3 years. I bought the bike from the second owner, but I also know the original owner fairly well. The bike used to have very nice black cherry color paint (original), but now it's Harley orange, and not a quality repaint at that. That's changing soon, as I worked at Home Depot for several years and if I never see Orange paint again, it will be too soon. All the bodywork is currently in a pile as the second owner took it all off so he could get the motor out to repair the bottom case after bottoming out on a large rock that was in the middle of a dirt road. The case has been professionally repaired, but he could never get the bike started again, hence my purchase price of $200.00. With the advice given here, I have a TCI on the way from Dingy that should be here in a couple of days, so hopefully that will get the bike to fire on all 4. I'm slowly figuring this bike out (it's the newest bike I own other than a 1997 Kawasaki KE100) and I'm sure that I'm going to have a lot more questions. Looking the bike over, I think that the mechanical issues are going to be few, but I can see some more electrical issues (other than the ignition) already. I have a new fuse block that I hope will cure a lot of the issues once I install it. Thanks for the help in the few posts I've made since joining here last week. Jeff

OK, I am going to preface this by saying that other than a Suzuki GT550, I've never had an electric starter system apart...every other bike I've owned is either kick only or the electric starter system never gave me a problem, so I don't know how, or have any real frame of reference as to how the electric leg works on the Venture. When I thought that the ignition pickups were bad (they aren't) I took off the generator cover and 2 shafts and 3 gears fell out. Naturally, I had 5 separate pieces on the floor instead of 2 assemblies. I put the pieces back in in what seems to me to be the logical way and I looked at the microfiche, but it's not 100% obvious as to the correct order that the parts install. Attached is a picture of how I reinstalled the gears. With no gears installed, the starter driven gear on the back of the rotor spins freely in 1 direction only as I figured that it would. With the gears installed as per the picture, I can't easily spin the driven gear in either direction, but it appears that this arrangement is the only way that everything lines up. Did I put this back together correctly or am I about to cost myself some serious money? Thanks, Jeff http://www.3cyl.com/jeff/starter%20gears.jpg

PM sent.

I checked the correct wires and I got 105 ohms on all 4 pickups. I confirmed it all the way up to the TCI, so I know the wiring is ok. Guess I need a TCI unit.

I use an old Triplett analog that I got from my grandfather. It's pretty accurate and besides, I can't test CDI magneto boxes on the Kawi H models with a digital meter...they don't respond quick enough to see if the SCR is firing. Digital meters are the anti-christ and my Philco M8100 takes too long for the tube to heat up...LOL Now that I know that the service manual is wrong, I'll recheck the pickup coils tomorrow using the black wire as the common. It did seem kind of weird to me that the orange wire would be the common, but I know very little about Yamaha 4 strokes and less about their wiring, so I took the manual to it's word. Looking at the wiring diagram now, my readings make sense...not correct to what they should be, but they make sense based on what is connected to what and how I measured them (based on the manual's instructions). Are there any other blatant screw ups in the manual that will have me pulling my hair out by setting something wrong...ie valve clearance at .02 instead of .002? If one of my pickups is bad, where can I get another? Thanks, Jeff

OK.. Tomorrow I'll re-check my resistances using the black as the common.

My Venture won't start. I have spark on 1 and 3. Nothing on 2 or 4. I've swapped the coils around and the problem moved to 1 and 3 when I swapped the wiring from the TCI, so I know the coils are good. According to page 7-17 of the service manual, I'm supposed to have 110 ohms between the Orange and all the other wires coming off the pickups. I have 105 ohms between the Orange and red/white but 200+ ohms between the Orange and all the rest. Am I looking at a pickup issue or a TCI issue? Thanks, Jeff

While I was trying to figure out why my new 83 venture wouldn't start a friend was trying to get the cap off the reservoir. I took the #2 Phillips, applied a little torque and hit it with a hammer. Worked great. I didn't have my impact driver with me at the time. JIS s screwdrivers are the best to use on Japanese bikes, but they are not always easy to find.