Ok, I took a big chance and unscrewed the start button stuff on the left hand side - BINGO!!!! It had a dirt dobber nest inside, don't know how that could happen but I am glad that I did that. My kill switch was corroded so I cleaned all of that out and just about got the kill switch unstuck, I am giving the lubricant spray I used time to work, then we will see if it will start!!! I will let you know what happens when I try it soon!

 

I got the start button working!!! I took it all out, cleaned it and texted the 2 wires coming off the green start button in ohms with the engine off and pushed the green button and it went from open to closed circuit!!! Now I got to figure out why it wont start up. It has spark with the electric part but not the kick start. I think I may have a fuel problem (I unscrewed the drain screw at the bottom of the carb and nothing came out). I does try to turn over, just seems like its not getting enough fuel or any possibly. Any ideas? Thanks so much - The wiring is fixed!!!!! You just don't know how excited I was to hear the click you were talking about! I hooked up the battery charger, and I did try to turn over without buying a single part - yet! I will take the bowl off the carb this afternoon and see if I am even getting gas in there! Thanks again!

 

I got it running, drove it around the yard, then it died which to me means.... carburetor need adjusting!!! I cant thank you enough - I can honestly say it didn't cost me not one dollar to fix - because I was patient - and didn't run out and buy parts without checking everything (which I would have done if you hadn't told me to wait)! Thanks for having patience with me!

 

And kudos to you too for being a quick learner, and having determination.

I learned something too. I've never seen a starter solenoid that looks like that...

 

Ok, I rode it around the yard - it died on me, I haven't got it to run since! The motor turns, but no fast enough to start the engine I guess. I don't have a clue what could be going on. I have tried to jump start it with the charger and it makes it spin a little faster, but not enough to start it. If that makes any since? I have checked my cdi and get voltage on the one that goes to the coil. I have tried to check the wires to make sure they are making good connection. What else could be wrong?

 

So am I correct? Your starter is spinning slow?

Using your charger to boost the quad battery may or may not work. It depends on your charger. Instead, use a pair of jumper cables and jump your quad battery to your car battery. Use extra care to get the polarity right - positive to positive and negative to negative. Does the starter motor spin OK now? If so does the quad start up?

The next question is: Do you have spark? Take out the spark plug and hold the plug threads up against the engine. While holding the plug in that position, and setting all kill switches to the "run" setting, crank the starter motor. Do you see steady spark across the plug gap at about ten times per second?

 

Yes I have spark, I don't know how consistant it is, but I have it! I take the spark plug out and put it in the cap and against the metal on the front of the motor. I have been able to get it to start about a hand full of times, as soon as I move the choke the slightest bit, it dies. I didn't try the car battery yet, but I will! Thanks

 

Could someone please tell me what this is. Luckily it was the only piece of my atv that caught fire. I unhooked it and saved the rest of the wiring harness from damage!!! Is this supposed to be grounded? If so, then would two black wires with hooks on the end connected to each other be ground or since they connected to each other be pointless? Thanks

 

Dawn, I saw your private message. I've been on vacation and have been out of touch. In fact I'm still on vacaton for a couple more days.

Again I need to point out that I have no experinece with Arctic Cats, but I'm suspecting that is a voltage regulator. I notice a couple things in the picture:

The burning all occurred at the connector, and the left side of the connector seems more burned than the right side. There is some info here to ponder. Wires that carry massive excess current can get and melt the insulation that surrounds them. In this case the melting/burning process would occur uniformly over the entire length of the wire(s). This did not happen in your case. The heat was all generated in the connector. That suggests a bad connection at the connector. That may have been the only thing wrong - a bad connection. Or the regulator may have failed - shorted out, and the weak link was a bad connection at that connector. This is actually complicated, but many voltage regulator designs use shunt regulation, which means they keep the battery from being overcharged by shorting out the battery charge winding(s) from the stator. This is counter intuitive, and flies in the face of common experience. For example I can't regulate the temperature of my kitchen oven by "shorting out" the my local power supplier. But stators are different. They are inherently current limiting and self protecting (unlike the power company were it not for circuit breakers). Trust me on this. The math is sound. It works. But it requires *good* and *solid* connections from the stator to the voltage regulator, and to ground. If a bad connection exists, instead of shorting the stator output to ground it instead loads it, and dissipates power - a lot of it. Heat and fire result.

We also need to make sure that your fuse coming off the battery hasn't been removed, or changed to too high a value. Near the battery you should find an inline fuse. Can you find that fuse and what is the value?

I'm not understanding 'the two black wires with hooks connected together' part. COuld I have some more detail?

 

If you have 2 wires (one with a male end and a fork type end & the other a female with a fork type end) both the fork ends are to a screw on the voltage regulator, the same screw - and the other ends are connected to each other. Isn't that pointless? Now on to the fire mishap (s) yes it happened again but worse. I didn't have the inline fuse - they were together. I put another regulator on and burned that one up and the plastic white connector before I could get the regulator off this time. Still think I should replace the red wire all together though, just in case. I had it running, but now am very leary of wiring all together - thats dangerous stuff! I have already had a few bad experiences with it! I am taking a break from the Arctic Cat for a few weeks til I can get my confidence back. Working on a different one with wiring problems - no spark? I did learn how to check voltage and make sure not to "bypass" the inline fuse or it could cause fires! If you want I can upload pics of # 2 fire voltage regulator. It looks a lot worse than it actually was! Still managed to save the rest from damage except the end of that red wire that hooked to the regulator.