My boy was out riding his Bayou 220 last weekend. He rode for a couple of hours, and then came back and said that the electric starter would not work. The battery is fairly new and is up. When you press the starter switch, you hear a click from under the seat, but no starter action. We tried to jump across the terminals on the solinoid under the seat, but nothing moves the starter. The starter can't be locked up, as the pull starter works fine. Any ideas on what I need to do, what the problem might be, or what I have to replace?

On the same ride, the boy said the quad was leaking oil. I went out and looked, and there was oil dripping out of a rubber hose that came down from underneath the tank. I couldn't find where the hose was attached to on the engine, but it ended up dripping down onto the left side of the engine, on top of the housing where the shaft drive is. In looking around, I found out that the kid had ridden the quad for quite some time with the choke on. He said it ran OK when he was moving, but when he stopped, it would kill. No kidding! Well, we talked with someone who works a lot on dirt bikes, and we surmised that with the choke on, it may have overflowed and put some gasoline into the oil, thinning it out to the point where it was causing blowby and the oil to pump up and out a breather line, which is what I am hoping that rubber hose is, as it doesn't go anywhere, isn't connected to anything, and just hangs there. I changed the oil and had the kid run the thing. The quad never did have any blow-by before, and didn't smoke or burn any oil. He ran it about 20 or 30 minutes, the thing still didn't smoke, and that rubber hose was dry, with nothing leaking out onto the engine or shaft drive housing. Could the gas in the oil have caused this? I hope it is taken care of, but I have never run into anything like this before.

Thanks for the help and ideas.

Todd M.
White Bear Lake MN

 

compression? fuses and or cdi. I would say to check for spark.

 

The thing runs fine, and didn't blow any oil out the tube when my boy ran it Saturday after I changed the oil, so I hope the oil thing was just thinned out oil due to gas in the oil. As for the starter, the thing starts easily with the pull starter, and runs fine, it just doesn't work with the electric start, it just clicks.

 

Is there a fuse for the starter that would cause the electric starter not to work but allow the engine to start and run with the pull starter?

 

my grandpa's tractor had the same problem with the starter, you turn the key and it just clicks. his problem was where the wires connect to the battery there was alot of crap around it. he just cleaned it off and the starter worked again. just a thought