CDI Repair
Sep 1, 2003 | 08:47 PM
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Weekend Warrior
Joined: Jul 2003
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CDI Repair
After a few posts to the Forums, without much sucess on repairing my Honda 300, I went ahead and ordered a book and traced the problem down to 99% probability to the CDI Box. Since this part is sooooo expensive, I decided to do some "net" research and see what I could do.
The two websites listed lower in this append describe some techniques to open the CDI and possibly repair it.
I decided to use my router table and cut the bottom of the CDI open with single shallow cuts just around the perimiter of the CDI . Its a bit tricky as you have to just take the hard plastic off then manually peel small bits of rubber off with your finger nail. A painstaking job, but after about 45 minutes I had a clean circuit board to look at. I could not find any defects on the solder joints, but when I plugged it back in, it ran like a champ!! I resoldered all the connections. I'm familiar with electrical soldering, but you may need to find a friend to help in this department. Whatever you do, do not use plumbing solder or paste etc. After reflowing all the connections, and reinstalling, everything ran GREAT! Just in case anyone is interested, here are a couple of websites that describe how to open the CDI and common repairs.
http://www.hukrc.freeserve.co.uk/cdi.html
http://www.ta-deti.de/ta/knownproblems.html
Of course you can't just leave the electronics exposed after opening the box, so I then wrapped a layer of masking tape along the edge of the CDI with approx 1/8 inch of the tape above the edge on the side with the circuit board. I then mixed up a full package of "2 tube" epoxy and poured it onto the circuit board ..using the rasied tape edge as a "form" to keep the epoxy from just running off. I used the slow set epoxy rather than the 5 minute stuff to try to avoid any problems with curring too fast and perhaps putting pressure on the board. Don't know if that would be a problem or not, but just wanted to be safe. Reinstalled, and the ATV runs great. From "NO SPARK" to running GREAT with virtually no cost.
Of course this will not fix every problem with CDI's, but I suspect that a few years (or months) of vibration takes its toll on solder joints and it could just save you a wad!..
MicoMan[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]
The two websites listed lower in this append describe some techniques to open the CDI and possibly repair it.
I decided to use my router table and cut the bottom of the CDI open with single shallow cuts just around the perimiter of the CDI . Its a bit tricky as you have to just take the hard plastic off then manually peel small bits of rubber off with your finger nail. A painstaking job, but after about 45 minutes I had a clean circuit board to look at. I could not find any defects on the solder joints, but when I plugged it back in, it ran like a champ!! I resoldered all the connections. I'm familiar with electrical soldering, but you may need to find a friend to help in this department. Whatever you do, do not use plumbing solder or paste etc. After reflowing all the connections, and reinstalling, everything ran GREAT! Just in case anyone is interested, here are a couple of websites that describe how to open the CDI and common repairs.
http://www.hukrc.freeserve.co.uk/cdi.html
http://www.ta-deti.de/ta/knownproblems.html
Of course you can't just leave the electronics exposed after opening the box, so I then wrapped a layer of masking tape along the edge of the CDI with approx 1/8 inch of the tape above the edge on the side with the circuit board. I then mixed up a full package of "2 tube" epoxy and poured it onto the circuit board ..using the rasied tape edge as a "form" to keep the epoxy from just running off. I used the slow set epoxy rather than the 5 minute stuff to try to avoid any problems with curring too fast and perhaps putting pressure on the board. Don't know if that would be a problem or not, but just wanted to be safe. Reinstalled, and the ATV runs great. From "NO SPARK" to running GREAT with virtually no cost.
Of course this will not fix every problem with CDI's, but I suspect that a few years (or months) of vibration takes its toll on solder joints and it could just save you a wad!..
MicoMan[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]
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