Wierd thing today. Last night I fired the prairie up and drove it over to a hose to clean out the radiator. Let it dry, fired back up and drove it into the barn. Changed the oil and went to bed. Got up this morning to go play and it will not fire. Both plugs have fire, fire at the coils. Pulled off the air box and shot a few drops of ether into the ports, still nothing. If i give it alot of gas while choking it will backfire on occasion, but after two hours of jerking around with it im whipped. Any clues?

Digitalsniper

2002 praire

 

Did you do anything out of the ordinary when you changed the oil? I'm just thinking it ran before, but not after you changed it. If you have fire, make sure you are getting gas too.

 

hmmmm, that is weird....

did you wash the whole machine? you may have some water hanging around somewhere. i would let it dry out alittle more....just because you have spark, doesn't mean that you have enough....check your battery connections, make sure they connections are torqued down....

don't use ether on the machine, the only reason you use ether is because it is extremely cold and need alittle extra octane to get it firing....fix the problem, which is something else...

i'm assuming you ride this machine regularly? is the gas old? did you get water in the gas?

 

Thanks for the replys, but still nothing.
Yea i ride it every few days. Nothing different on the oil change. And no i didnt wash the entire bike. Just took the front clip off to wash out the radiator good, drove it back to the barn, put the clip on, changed the oil and rubbed it down with son of a gun. I took it two two different mechanics (not ATV, but none the less mechanics) and it had them stumpped too. So i guess tuesday ill be taking it to a shop and see if they can figure it out. If i hadnt run perfectly the night before, and then POW, nothing the next day it wouldnt be so confusing. But since it did run so good last night and not at all today, im baffled.

Who knows, maybe while its in the shop after they fix it i might go ahead and trade it on a BF.

 

dsniper. try to pour a little bit of gas down both carbs. see if it will start then. maybe your fuel pump or fuse is bad.

 

Try again tomorrow when its good and dry. The spark plug wires might be wet and conducting the spark to ground. The poping and backfire means its lean. And means you have spark...at least occasionally.
Are you out of gas? Try reserve.
If it wont start with the throttle closed...try 1/4 open, while cranking. Or try covering the snorkle air opening, to choke it, while cranking. Just cover the opening, about 75% closed. This will make it very rich, and it should start then.

 

.. try pouring a little gas into each cylinder directly, via the spark plug hole.

 

my stupid moped (that i am gonna port and some other mods LOL i need a life) has this problem too nothing seemingly wrong but won't work try draining your carbs or cleaning them

 

Tommorow at lunch im going to get a couple more sparkplugs. Neither of the ones I have seem to center fire but all around the edges. A mech on another forum told me that was the problem and suggested the plugs. I REALLY hated it not working this weekend. our group went to Ocean pond (local mudhole) and the fla hurricanes really put it all deep underwater. I had an opportunity to show the prairie off and what it can do, but instead was stuck riding on a grizzly that was shy of water.

Anyhoo thanks everyone for their suggestions. Tried them all, so ill do the sparkplug thing before taking it to the shop.


Digitalsniper

One more thing. Two weeks ago we went to the pumpkin run in Daytona beach and i saw several broke down Brute forces. I was kind of let down by their failure rate out there. Sure hope it was just idiots that bought them that weekend and didnt do any breaking in.