Animal PVL

B

Bobby Shine

New member
i'm getting back into karting, bought a kart with an Animal engine on it. it had the stock flywheel and typical mower coil on it. I ordered a PVL kit, flywheel and mag. (555683 and 555681) I put it on, fired it, all was good. I went to race it Sunday, made 2 warm-up sessions. went to run the first heat, it didn't start. no spark. I tried 3 different plugs, checked the kill button, even unplugged the ground wire, still no spark. checked the flywheel key, that was ok. Reset the air gap on the mag, and in stages i got hit & miss spark (thready) then a steady but thready spark. went to run a 10 lap feature & on lap 8 it just died. I'm right back to no spark. new out of the box, both items. anyone else run into this problem? could i have a bad Mag? Thank you for your time.
 

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Check where the plug wire pushes into the coil. This is a "snap" fit, and often I've seen it get pulled apart. This is more common when a racer pulls the coil wire to shut the engine off.
Also make sure that the plug end of the wire snaps over the end of the plug. The end of the wire can get pulled back into the plug boot and not fit correctly over the end of the plug if not careful.

I'm not a big fan of the kill switch, BUT, on the animal and L206, it sure is better than pulling the plug wire to kill the coil.


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Thanks and God bless,
Brian Carlson
Carlson Racing Engines
Vector Cutz
www.CarlsonMotorsports.com
Carlson Motorsports on FaceBook
29 years of service to the karting industry
Linden, IN
765-339-4407
bcarlson@CarlsonMotorsports.com
 
Unplugging the switch is usually not going to fix anything. I can't remember the last time i have seen a bad kill switch.
What often happens is the wire from the kill switch to the coil gets pinched under the tin air shield. That's the black metal piece that goes over the cylinder fins. I would suggest you take the blower housing off and the air shield and use a small zip tie to secure the kill wire to the coil mounting post. Or if you want to reach in through the hole between the blower housing, the intake manifold and the air shield and unplug the kill wire from the coil then try to start it and see what happens.
Also make sure the coil is not rubbing on the flywheel.
Often times the coil gets blamed for some other problem. I have seen very few bad ones over the years.
I would suggest you use the kill switch to shut off the engine!! Pulling the plug wire off is asking for trouble.
 
Thanks Brian, do you mean the plug wire can come out of the mag it's self? I use the kill button even thoe i do have a wire tie on the plug boot for the "in case" situation. and on the plug boot end, yes there's a click as it goes on the plug. but i never had a coil/mag not work but then come back and kinda sorta work. It's usually ... it works or it don't.
 
Thanks Jimbo, if the switch went bad it could've been in the kill mode, that's why i pulled the ground off to see if that was the issue. I will dig deeper as a new one is being shipped to me. I've been told these blue mags last for ever. leave it to me to get that one that's bad, things happen ya know? and i'll look to see if routing the ground wire might be the issue. But the whole time with the stock flywheel & mower coil, she started right up without issue. and i've made sure the air gap was spot on, is funny because after i reset the air gap that's when it started the hit & miss, then came back thready and enough to run 8 laps under green. then gave up the ghost all together.
 
Thanks Steve, that just made me feel better. sometimes it's better to ask and have a new set of eyes lookin at it, because i could be over looking something. I'm focused on what did and not seeing the problem. i switched out the flywheel, mounted the mag, set air gap, hooked up the kill wire, fired it and ran it till it was warm. then ran 2 warm-up sessions with it with no issues. So I'm lookin at what i did.
 
Is there allot of corrosion and muck where the coil bolts on, that's a connection too. I would sandpaper those spots a little. If the coil is boarder line it can work ok at room temp then open up when it gets warm.
 
I think Jimbo had a thread recently in the 206 section which he decided the magnet on the flywheel failed, leading to intermittent loss of spark.
 
Thanks Sundog, the engine is cleaner then a whistle, and the kit i bought was new. I've seen what your talking about on older lawn equipment. and I'm racing on a paved road course so it's not filled with dirt or clay.
 
Thanks Shaw, when I remove the current mag I'll check the strength of the magnet. but when i set air gap on it, it sucked the mag right toward the magnet. so i think it's plenty strong enough. I also scrolled down thru the posts to see if any one else had the same issue. i didn't want to double post on the same issue, but i didn't see it.
 
Shaw, thanks for the link. I found the read interesting, but like Jimbo said it came with it and was used. Mine is new out of the box, I think it's more mag issue then flywheel. But I am going to go over everything when i take it apart to R & R the mag.
 
Thanks Brian, do you mean the plug wire can come out of the mag it's self?
Click to expand...

Absolutely. They simply snap/push together. I'd check that connection first (on your old failed coil.)


I used to think that these coils were pretty much bullet proof. I don't know, may 15 years or so (since the animal was introduced,) I have not had one failure...then this spring I had two fail in one state. Although rare, indeed they can, and do, occasionally fail.
 
Bobby Shine said:
Thanks Brian, do you mean the plug wire can come out of the mag it's self? I use the kill button even thoe i do have a wire tie on the plug boot for the "in case" situation. and on the plug boot end, yes there's a click as it goes on the plug. but i never had a coil/mag not work but then come back and kinda sorta work. It's usually ... it works or it don't.
Click to expand...

I had my kill wire come unplugged from the coil last year. Squeezing the connector kept it on the rest of the year. I haven't taken it apart yet, but apparently the kill wire pulled right out of the connector last Sunday. It was hanging outside of the shroud. Like you I have a zip tie on the spark plug connector just in case - a very good idea!
 
"Absolutely. They simply snap/push together. I'd check that connection first (on your old failed coil.)"

Thanks Brian, I will check that. I already contacted them and they are sending me a replacement mag. Wish these were like older snowmobile coils there was a screw stud you screwed the new plug wire into them.
 
Thanks Brett, always have a back up. I've seen karts flip and the throttle stuck wide open, it's either choke em to death, or yank that plug wire. cause you can't get to that kill button. I've seen where some actually yanked the fuel line off the carb (2 stroke late 60's early 70's) not what i'd do... but seen it done.
 
Pulling the plug wire out of the coil scares me. They are on so tight that i'm afraid i'd ruin either the wire or the coil trying to get them apart.
 
Jimbo said:
What often happens is the wire from the kill switch to the coil gets pinched under the tin air shield. That's the black metal piece that goes over the cylinder fins. I would suggest you take the blower housing off and the air shield and use a small zip tie to secure the kill wire to the coil mounting post. Or if you want to reach in through the hole between the blower housing, the intake manifold and the air shield and unplug the kill wire from the coil then try to start it and see what happens.
Click to expand...

That happened to mine. Didn't find the issue until i had already bought a new coil...
 
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