GS450 on One Cylinder

[Guest]

Hello all, been a while. Still have the 450, running amazing these days.

Just ran into a bit of a problem though. A little while ago I noticed an intermittent bog that would randomly show up while riding. I'd be cruising along at around 4500 RPM when the bike would lose some power, in and out, kind of jerky and random. I know now that this loss of power was definitively due to the right cylinder not getting spark.

Fast forward, I was able to trace the issue to the spark plug wire connection, redid it and its ran fine for the last month or so, until today. While on the highway at ~60-70mph it happened again, luckily I was able to exit quickly and pull over. I fiddled with the plug cap to no avail, limped home and let it sit for a second. Went to play with it some more and it runs just fine again - I did nothing but let it sit.

I'm wondering what I am potentially looking for here? I'm thinking coil or ignitor issue. Would an issue with the ignitor cause one cylinder to die? Could it be something as simple as a loose connection somewhere?

Looking for some advice and other opinions here before I start poking and prodding. Thanks!

[tom203]

Probably a connection from signal generator up to ignitor or from there up to ignition coils.

[Big Rich]

Could it be the ignition coil overheating and losing spark until it cools down? I had a 68 Honda that would do that.

[jeffasaurus2]

I'm hoping its simply a loose connection somewhere, mostly because its an easy fix. The overheating coil seems more realistic though. Is that a common thing?

I had it happen again today, went to open it up a bit to pass someone and it cut out. Next light I killed the engine and let it sit ~30 seconds and it started up running A-ok again...

[jeffasaurus2]

So I finally took some time to look into this problem. Suspected that coil was overheating as suggested as it was an intermitten cylinder failure, usually after the bike had fully warmed up.

Replaced the right side coil with a used OEM spare I had on hand and the issue appears to be resolved. Took it out for a nice long ride and saw zero issues after replacing the coil.

Figured I'd fill in the details in case someone found this and wondered how I had resolved the issue.

[60ratrod]

Yeah, definitely sounds like the coil was toast. Next time this happens, just go with the dyna green coils. Totally worth the cost

[jeffasaurus2]

I plan on replacing the ignition system with the Dynate Ds3-3c, (Whatever it is Pete used). I'm trying to wait until snow though so I can rewire the bike correctly, something I've been putting off for a while.

I just happened to have an extra set of OEM coils laying around so I made due with what I have to finish out the season.

[pete]

Ummm... I'm back to stock ignition... don't know if it was just bad luck or not but I've had two Dyna's fail on me now, both out of warranty unfortunately but both exactly the same symptoms. Intermittent one cylinder until it would fail completely.

I won't say don't do it as I know too many others have great success with them, but I managed to score a second hand ignitor cheaply from Greg on here and since then she's been faultless.

One issue I do have though is the stock signal generator is a bit loose and a couple of times I've freaked myself with no spark at all until I give it a wiggle then all good. A strategically placed cable tie will solve that issue

I still run the Dynatek black 5 ohm coils and plug leads and they're great.

[jeffasaurus2]

Dang, that's good to know. I was excited to eliminate the ignitor assembly but if that's the case I think I'll just replace the coils.

[pete]

I would've chased the Dynatek issue further if it was more convenient, but it would've meant many weeks without my bike given my location here in Aus and Dynatek being in the US. The distributors here won't be able to help much in that scenario... so as I said I wouldn't say don't do it, but if it's not broken I'd say don't fix it