No Spark

[mightymite]

Hello all, I am helping a friend with their motor. It is a 1982 Chrysler 15 hp. This is a twin cylinder with magneto ignition. It has no spark. I cleaned and set the points. Visually everything looks fine, but still no spark. So I checked the coils and there is no continuity from the ground to the spark plug end. I get the same reading on both coils. I checked the kill switch and it is not causing the problem. I also took the plug end of a spark plug wire apart and tried a reading direct to the wire . No change.The coils look almost new. Could it be they are both bad. Or am I missing something. All help appreciated.

John, member 954-295-9813, slrjon@yahoo.com

[fleetwin]

Seems unlikely both coils failed that way unless someone sent some sort of current through the ignition via the stop switch….
The resistance of the secondary circuit is pretty high, what meter are you using and what scale do you have it set to?

[mightymite]

I checked the meter with a good OMC coil. I/m sure that is not an issue.

[jcrigan]

I had a 57 Johnson 18hp motor that had all new magneto parts including spark plug wires. Couldn’t get it to fire. Previous owner had installed resistance wire in place of copper core wire. Ran great after replacing the wires.

[mightymite]

When I had the plug end(boot) off I checked and it was a copper core wire.

[mightymite]

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[mightymite]

My next thought was that it was not wired correctly. There is a red wire from the top of the coil to the back of the points. Then a blue from the back of the points to the condensor. There is also a brown that goes from the back of the points to underneath the coil (kill switch ?) And there is a short red that goes from the base of the points to the coil( ground ?)

[1946zephyr]

I don’t believe those coils to be bad, either. They look too good. I would bet something is wired incorrectly. I never worked on Chryslers, so I wouldn’t know.

[amuller]

I don’t see anything obviously wrong with the wiring, but would suggest tracing out and checking any kill switch wiring.

There should be continuity from the spark plug connector to ground. Usually in the range of 5,000-10,000 ohms (coil secondary resistance). If open circuit, first check the coil ground lead. Is it possible that the coil primary lead (goes to the points) and ground leads are interchanged? I don’t know the color codes offhand. Do you have a manual?

If necessary, you can probably use OMC "universal magneto" coils in this motor.

[fleetwin]

Not familiar with the Chryslers, or what the secondary resistance is supposed to be… It surely is possible you have the coils wired to the wrong points, but again am not familiar…Perhaps the point cam is upside down on the crank, don’t know if that is possible on these engines…
Perhaps Ben Dittmar will chime in…

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