Greetings all! New member from KY here. So, let me bring everyone up to speed on my new "project". An old friend recently gave me an 87 KX500 as payment for getting his Bobcat running. The last time he rode the bike was 4 years ago at which point it ran great and the engine was fresh. He was involved in a serious accident which led to the bike being stored until 2 weeks ago. I brought the bike home and started all the normal maintenance along with rebuilding the carb. So, I got everything ready to go and didn't have any spark. I tested the electronics by the manual and found the ignition coil was toast. I scrounged up a good coil and now I have spark. At this point, the bike should run, or, at least, pop, fart, backfire or something. Nada, nothing! I can't come up with any mechanical reason why this bike shouldn't run. Compression is good, no blowback through the reeds and no obvious air leaks. Here's what I need to know, since I'm not a CDI guru; will a bad CDI box fire the coil, but at the wrong time? I ask because the spark I'm getting doesn't look normal to me. I'm a mechanic, just not a CDI guy, and everything I've ever spark tested before has a single spark across the plug at the appropriate time. This thing looks like a taser across the plug. I'm talking about grounding the plug on the head and pushing the kicker through by hand. Does this sound normal or do I need to start looking for a CDI box? Thoughts?
