Magneto ignition system diagnosis

[MotoMike]

For the condensor, In the Ducati maintenance books, they claim that you can charge the condensor with a battery and then short the lead to the case and get a spark. I have not been able to do this - anyone else ?


Tony

Make sure to clean the condenser so that you are pretty sure there is no conducting goo or other residue on the outside.

in testing a condenser with an analog meter you are using the battery in the meter to charge the capacitor. As previously mentioned in a DC circuit which this would be, the cap for it's first time constant will act mostly like a short and rapidly charge over the course of 5 time constants until it acts as an open. This is seen on the meter set to measure resistance as the needle jumping from infinity trying to get over and register zero, but before it gets very far, value changes to infinity. so it is seen as the needle jumping off infinity and then settling back to infinity. These time constants will be very quick with no additional resistance in the circuit, so you have to have your meter set to the lowest scale if you hope to see the needle jump at all. that is to say the scale that gives the most needle deflection for each ohm. An analog meter is well suited for this kind of check, as a digital will probably loose the jump while it is sampling right at the beginning. you can, once you measure it, reverse the leads and try again making sure not to provide a path for the cap to discharge while you are switching the leads.

I have checked the caps by charging with a battery and then shorting the leads together. with only 6 volts as your charging supply, don't expect a big show. I would do the test in a poorly lighted area and put something black as your background so that the spark will have good contrast to be seen. make it easier on yourself by using a small nine volt battery as you won't need to extend the lead to reach both battery terminals.

In a former life, we would have great fun charging big power supply filter capacitors to a couple hundred volts and then leaving them sitting on a fellow technicians work bench in his way. then if he was not careful when he went to move them,and his hand got across the terminals, he would receive a painful shock. I myself was victim of this prank. (once) those high quality caps can hold a charge for a very long time.

All that said, didn't you already measure the condenser and find it read as your new one did? We know it is not shorted, so it is not responsible for your engine not running.

[JimF]

Bob,

You are welcome to do anything you want with this thread and your other threads except delete them. There is a plan underway (as of yesterday) to take all the electrical system posts for compilation into a new web-page that will present them in a somewhat organized and structured way. To that end your re-editing it to clear up confusion and eliminate mistakes would be welcomed.

With a new electrical page in the Tech section forum users won't have to search through several posts of different subjects each with a half dozen replies trailing behind.

This will not negate these existing posts or prohibit future posts about electrics, but it will try to give us and future forum members a thorough reference page on everything that is both Ducati singles and electrical. It may keep poor souls like Bob from stating the same thing over and over as new people join us in the future, even if stating the same thing is just saying "search the old posts!"

Up for debate is whether or not to make this new electrical page visible to the world from day one while it is still crude and subject to flurries of edits, re-organizations, erroneous entries etc. In this way the forum users could make suggestions as the page develops. Or maybe the page should get some substantial development work before it's introduced so that most of the critiques would be gentle refinements as opposed to broad sweeping general comments such as "Hey, dumb*sses, your entire web-page is nonsensical."

[DewCatTea-Bob]

" There is a plan underway
to take all the electrical system posts for compilation into a new web-page that will present them in a somewhat organized and structured way. "

____ That's somewhat of a coincidence Jim, cuz I've been waiting for the up-coming 1-year anniversary to suggest that this w.site-forum be divided-up into three main/head-sections,, one for electrics, one for engines, & one for the rest.
__ And also suggest that as threads fall-off the front page (of 25 newer-threads), that they then be filed within their respective head-sections.
I've been giving this some thought for months now and have been meaning to bring-up to you the possibility of somehow getting the like done, (just for the same reasons as you too have realized on your own!).


" With a new electrical page in the Tech section forum users won't have to search through several posts of different subjects each with a half dozen replies trailing behind. "

____ I've also thought of this concern but, then that means that in order for a progressing thread to retain it's original progression, the required posts for the new-section would have to COPIED-over rather than MOVED-over, to the new-section, (which seems to break a rule against duplicate-postings).


" Up for debate is whether or not to make this new electrical page visible to the world from day one while it is still crude and subject to flurries of edits, re-organizations, erroneous entries etc. "

____ I really think that the new/planned head-section should only include postings that have already been well picked-through so that the contained info could be considerably more counted upon to be good/reliable-info, that way the readers won't have to wonder whether or not the stuff they're reading is as questionable, as it certainly could be when still on the fresh-threads page !
And I think that by the time a new topic gets rotated-over to the second-page (of the 8 pages we now have), that it's been worked-over enough by then, to finally be worthy of inclusion into the new-section.


____ These posts (about this news), also would be better placed within the thread: 'Website Requests', and I suggest that be done after they've had a little-more time still left here.


HOPEful-CHEERs,
-Bob