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Hello - a few weeks ago I took the Morini for a good long ride in the West Lakes -about 120 miles. Over Corney fell to the coast - up toward Whitehaven then in to Buttermere. Over Honister pass to Borrowdale and Keswick then down to Ambleside and Hawkshead where I lost the rear cylinder and the electronic tacho. I nursed the bike home on one cylinder and gave it a good check over as the roads were very bumpy and with the hard suspension set up I have something could have come loose - nothing evident. A few days later the same occurred when the bike was warm - but after covering only about 10 miles. A few days later I checked through some obvious things and checked the timing - it lost the cylinder after only a few minutes doing timing checks - again each time I lost the tacho so am presuming an electrical rather than a carb fault. It has a new battery and the stator was rewound a few years ago due to a similar problem of the front cylinder failing after a few miles - this solved that problem. Here's where I have to admit I should have left well alone removed the Ignition components and had them tested. The wiring on the red pick up looked poor ( I had previously re soldered one of the connections) so I decided to re do them - my soldering is not great and when the pick up was replaced I got no spark at all on either cylinder. Presuming my poor soldering skills had killed the pick up I ordered one of the NLM ones but this also produces no sparks at all. During this whole process I had also removed cleaned and reconnected quite a few wires in the spaghetti junction box so it is possible I have disturbed something. - So I have gone from a bike that started and then soon went on to run on one cylinder to a bike that doesn't spark at all - any suggestions _ I feel I am missing something- thanks - Duncan

Try these tests

http://youtu.be/CWgLYidtHVw

http://youtu.be/eY7ZXSAzR7A

A long time from the initial post but work and family issues have meant I have not had a lot of time for the bike- and still no luck. I checked the ignition components as best I could following Paul's videos and they seemed to be ok -no luck so sent them to nlm to be tested -again they assured me that all the components worked. Again no ignition - I have tried running the green wire direct to the transducers to cut out problems at the junction box but still no response - except bizarrely once - it fired up once a couple of weeks ago but cannot get it to repeat. I wonder what experience others have had with the nlm pickup. They told me it was very important that the gaps were minimal between the rotor and the pickup switches - instructions say less than o.1 mm but following instructions as i tighten the retaining screws it draws the rotor face away from the front switch. Also looking down from above the rotor face is not parallel with the switch face so only the outer edge of the rotor gets anywhere near it. This can't be adjusted out. Any one else had any issues with this? Thanks Duncan

Are you sure that all the ground cables are ok and well conected?

I once had the problem of a mistaking red pickup always when the motor started to be warm after a few miles on that famous trip in the UK at the beginning of the 80s. It was failing always one cilinder. The solucion to get home again was taking of the cover of the pickup to keep it cooler (it took me 4 days to find it out, with the help of Steve from Bristol ). After getting home the pickup gave up definetly a few days later.

But you say that you have checked al the electronic parts If handling with the wires the green one going to the boxes had contact for less than one second with a red (or brown one) you surely burned the boxes!

If there is no spark at al: first test the ignicion coil on the generator, there must be at least 180 ohm to have a good spark. When this is ok: Take of the plugs, the bike on the main stand, second o third gear, sit down on it an a second person trurning the rear wheel in the right direction. Between the green wire from the generator and ground there should be nearly about 90V. If this is ok, your flywheel and ignition coil should be ok.

... to be continued, the call me to do the fish in the pan ...

norbert

Dunk, you said, that your rear cilinder was failing at the same time as the rv. counter. That mekes me think, that your rev counter is conected to the box of the rear cilinder. There must have been something wrong! Or with the signal of the pickup for the second cilinder or with that box.
Even if you put the pickup in the wrong posicion, there should be a spark (without the motor working od course).

Now things have changed and become a little more complicated because now you don´t have any spark at all, if I understood it well

If the ingicion coil and the magneto flywheel are in condicions (proved like said above) there are still:
-plug leads, their "pipes", and plugs, mostly improbable that they gave up in the same moment on both cilinders.
- pickup
- boxes

As you already have conected the green wire dirctly to the boxes we can forget about the ignicion switch and the motorstop switch en the handlebar.
Ground wires of the boxes and the pickup prooved? (sometimes people wonder after restoring and painting the frame wonder wether there are electronical problems
With a spark on one cilinder it is quiet easy to find out wether the problem is the pickup or a box changing the red wires from the pickup on the boxes (guess you all know that). If there still is no spark at all, from my opinion you need one box from that you know that it is ok. Then you can find out wether the problen is the pickup or not.

good luck

norbert

Can anyone else who has used the NLM pick up let me know how easy it was to set up? thanks - Duncan

Have you tried disconnecting the rev counter

I've used the NLM pickup and it was fine once I'd called them to ask about a wire that wasn't accounted for on the instructions, if I remember rightly. They will have amended this by now I'd imagine. I've had no problems since fitting it.
DD

Finally got round to putting on the nlm transducer replacement that I ordered a couple of months ago - ( weather here not been good for working outside) despite the fact that the transducers tested ok it still bothered me that the rev counter had cut out when the cylinder did so thought I would try it before I gave up. It fired pretty much straight away -just been for a run around the coast road and it seems to pull more strongly with the full ignition replacement even though it still needs everything balancing and timing properly - could just be imagination after a break in riding. All I can assume is that the transducers indicated ok on an ideal test rig but there are too many other variables on a 35 year old bike if it they were operating near their limit - thanks for everyone's help - now looking forward to the better weather - Duncan