It tells me your starter motor, battery, and starter wiring are working.

So do you have spark while manually shorting the solenoid posts together to turn the starter motor? To do this turn off all spark kill switches, take your spark plug out, wire it back up to the spark plug wire, hold the spark plug threads against the engine block while turning the engine with the starter motor. Fat blue spark across the spark plug gap is what you want to see.

 

Lynn - I did connect the posts on the solenoid and it did cause the started to turn continuously, but not fire or even make an attempt at starting. What do you think that is caused by...

thanks for the help thus far

 

Spark, Fuel, Compression. You need all of those for an engine to run. Any one of those will keep it from running. The first step is to see if there is spark.

Did you do that test? Do you have spark? When you do these tests be sure that the ignition is on and all kill switches are turned off.

 

Lynn - Dont mean to sound dumb, but by doing a spark test do you mean to pull the spark plug cord, and keep it 1 -2 mm from the plug and see if it arcs, or did u mean something else.

 

Not a dumb question at all...

Your "pull the spark plug cord" idea is close, but not quite there. Instead, the usual way is to pull the plug wire, hook it to another spare spark plug, and then hold the plug mounting threads against the engine block while trying to start the engine. You want to see a fat spark across the plug gap.

If you're cheap like me you don't have a spare plug lying around, so you pull out the one in the engine and use it instead. It works, but this isn't as good for two reasons: First, the engine now has a big hole in it that could be spitting out combustable fuel air mixture next to an exposed spark. I cringe whenever I do this, and lay to the side with an extinguisher at the ready. Second, that big hole in the engine reduces the engine compression to zero, and the engine now spins faster. If your quad isn't producing spark because the engine is normally spinning just a tad too slow for the spark trigger input to the CDI, then now that it is spinning faster you could get a false indication that spark is fine.

The problem with pulling the spark plug wire and looking for spark across the gap is that the connection to the plug is way up inside the plug boot. You can't see in there. You could stick a bolt (or something) up there so make connection and hold that close to engine ground. That would work too, but you don't want to let the plug wire hang free with no narrow spark path to ground while cranking the engine. With no spark path to ground to dissipate the energy in the coil the voltage on the coil secondary winding will rise to tremendous levels, and the coil itself may arc over to ground (internally) and be ruined. If the coil arcs back over to the primary winding the CDI could be taken out as well. Using a plug to maintain the spark gap and making sure the threads of the plug are held up against the engine ground while cranking is a much less error prone procedure.

 

Lynn- The plot thickens. I pulled the plug and did the spark test, and it did arc. I also got the motor to start and run by touching the two solenoid posts together. It ran fine, but when I tried to restart it w/ the handle start button or the electric start fab, not a thing. Does that mean there is something wrong w/ the start button on the handle? I tried w/ the hand brake on and off, didnt matter.

 

If your look at your starter solenoid you will see two small wires coming out and go into a connector about 6 inches or so from the solenoid. Inside the solenoid these two wires drive a coil of wire wound around a steel core. When you apply 12 volts across the coil it makes a magnetic field which sucks down a steel plate that shorts the two big posts together (just like you did manually with a screwdriver) which turns the starter motor.

When you try to start the quad with the start button, or by using the remote control, do you hear a "click" coming from the solenoid? If you do then that means the internal plate is getting sucked down but the post aren't getting shorted together. If this is the case the solenoid is bad. They're cheap and easy to replace.

If you *don't* hear a "click" then get a meter and measure the voltage across the two small wires when pushing the start button and/or using the remote. Do you have 12 volts being applied to the two small wires? If yes, and your solenoid isn't clicking then it is bad. If no, then there is a wiring problem.

One side of your solenoid coil (small wires) should be connected to ground. The other side ties to 12 volts through your brake switch > ignition switch > fuse >battery (all wired in series), or though your remote > ignition switch > battery.