1998 sportsman 500 4x4. just replaced the 2 stator bobbins, cdi, and ign. coil. ran fine for little while. battery was shot. while battery was unhooked. kid pullrope started and it overvolted and took out all light bulbs. got new battery n bulbs. ran fine now will not start. weak spark unless ropepull. tried to start with full charge battery and seperate battery only on starter. same result.bout ready for lighter fluid and a match. ?????????:

 

i have heard of that before where the bike will start w/ the pull rode but the starter. not sure if it's becuase the engine isn't turning as fast w/ the starter as the rope?? how was the flywheel magnets? clean rust free and set at the right air gap from stator? just a thought.

ps. i will delete the other double post of the regular forum as you have it posted here.

 

The old flywheel on the 98 model has been upgraded to a new number for some time now and I don't believe its just because of magnet separation that happened a lot that destroyed stators, but also because of weak fire problems. The magnets are fully enclosed on the replacement,same as all the later models that we never had a problem with. OPT

 

not real excited about giving polaris any more money for parts. it runs when pulled. would voltage reg. rect. failure do somthing like this. even when battery out voltage should not have spiked that hard. only thing not replaced. flywheel was cleaned and looked good. stator ohmed great after repair.

 

Voltage should be 14-14.5 volts when running at battery,voltage spikes with battery leads removed while running can sometimes do some damage to the major components! Just check voltage to eliminate reg/rectifier possible damage. All sorts of electrical problems can happen. With battery disconnected the voltage from the reg/rectifier has to go somewhere!! It takes the path of least resistance first,usually the bulbs,but can go further! OPT

 

i don't think a bad recifier would have anything to do w/ a starting issue as it's job is to control the amount voltage and as mentioned w/ out a battery in place all kinds of bad things can happen and very expensive as well.

 

Mine would start with the pull rope but not with the electric start, turned out it had a dirty Pulse/trigger coil face. I cleaned it and the flywheel and its been good since.

 

flywheel is good. even with battery out a decent voltage regulator would keep voltage down to 14-14.5 volts. pulse coil ohms good. will adjust n try. polaris needs to get with the program on their quads. electrical issues all over as I read.after working on this older carberated machine, they couldn't have made it more complicated. all the issues people are having with the newer sportsmans maybe they should built in a little durability and longetivity. tuff machine otherwise. will go anywhere but still polaris not learning from electrical issues. looking towards honda or arctic cat for next utility machine.

 

The point is that the voltage from the regulator/rectifier is suposed to go BACK into the battery! With the cables disconnected the voltage can go its way into least resistance areas already mentioned (bulbs) and into other components! Its not unusual and I have seen cdi's and harness wires melted because of this. OPT