Was out beating my Bayou 220 this weekend on the Muddy trails in Livingston, KY.
After about 5 hours of riding I stopped at the edge of a mud hole to wait for a buddy to catch up, we'd been running through the mud, creeks and climbing hills and rocks all day, nothing unusual for us, done this about once or twice a month since October. I was sitting there idling and the quad died.
I hit the start button and heard a buzzzzing coming from uner the seat. Took the seat off, looked, you could visibly see the starter solenoid vibrating. there was no mud or water covering it, just a little dust. I resorted to the recoil backup (thank God for that) and we went on riding. I thought the battery might be low.
Saturday monring washed the quad, took the battery out and had it load tested at a nearby dealer. Battery was fine. I also noticed that in the morning my starter solenoid no longer buzzed or did anything when I hit the start button. The Neutral and Reverse indicator lights didn't light up anymore either. I tried crossing the solenoid with a screwdriver to bypass it, that didn't work either, the starter didn't turn over, just nothing. Tried hooking up jumper cables to the battery and crossing the solenoid, nothing. It still starts everytime when I pull the recoil.
Anyone have any ideas what the problem might be here? I'm stumped. I don't want to buy a bunch of new parts to findout it was something stupid. Headlights still work, quad fires right up. There's no mods, to it other than some new tires.

 

Spoke to a good friend just last week who was telling me about the only problem he ever had with his Bayou 300. It was a starting problem that he evetually traced to a corrosion in the fuse holder.

Your problem too should be easy to find since the worst case is a defective neutral switch inside the transmission. I've been told that replacing the neutral switch requires opening the engine. Of course there is probably a way to bypass it as well.

 

There is a relay in all the wire mess around the battery. It's in a black rubber boot and clips on to a hanger. Mine came unhooked and was sitting upside down, filled up with water and froze. If I remember right, when I had it out and ran it the indicator lights didn't work.
I pulled the relay apart and cleaned it, worked great after that.

Tim

 

Thanks for the help guys.
I charged the battery all night, put it in the quad, the neutral light came on bright (like it should) hit the starter, solenoid clicked about twice and then nothing, I looked at the neutral light again (had cover off of it) the filimnet was barely glowing. This leads me to beleive the kid at that Honda/Suzuki store didn't know how to test the battery, because this behaves like a battery with a short in it.
Got a new battery coming in this AM, if it dosen't work then I'll check that other piece and go from there.

 

Ok put the new battery in, same problem repeated itself immediately.
So I looked at the posts here again. I pulled out that relay inside the rubber boot like grizzlytim said. Pulled the connector off (it was a little loose) and blew out the connection ends. Put it back together. Pull started the bike (one pull, nice), then rode around my front yard scaring dogs and old people that walked by. Did a few 1st and second gear wheelies in the yard and on the driveway. (I have Titan Fast Trekker tires 22x11 on, makes a huge traction difference). Came back to the garage, hit the kill switch, turned it back on and hit the starter button, viola! It works, killed it a few times just to make sure, so one of two things happened. 1) That relay connection was off just enough to screw up things. 2) Beating on the bike across a flat surface and jarring it around a little knocked whatever came loose back into wack. This happens a lot with my brake lights.
Thanks again for all your help.
DynoDon