[ke5aux]

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Ok so I have recently acquired two 1100 Standart Wings. First wing for me.
One is a 80 with a rusted and broken frame but complete engine and fried electrics with no title. The other a frame with a title and electrics but not a complete engine.

The 80 came with a brand new OEM starter in a box. I promptly installed it, and finally got the motor to budge. I removed the spark plugs and now the motor spins up pretty well using the starter.
However, when I put in either a spark plug or a compression tester, the starter motor will stop and struggle on the compression stroke for that cylinder. How can I test the compression of the engine? If it is good, how will it ever turn the motor over with spark plugs in it?

The button/relay/cables are working properly and I have even tried it with direct wire from a larger charged car battery to starter.

As a bonus, attached is a picture of the fried ignition modules

 

[Bike...and Dennis]

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Hi KE5,

Welcome to the forum.

I'm presently lost on your problem, but someone will have some suggestions soon. Maybe I'll have an epiphany later and chime in.

 

[ke5aux]

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Thanks! It really has been a crap-shoot for me lately. All these old engines are either locked up or missing ignition components. This one was showing signs by spinning freely, but now this.

 

[ke5aux]

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By doing some research, I am thinking it may have something to do with the starter clutch?

 

[ke5aux]

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Went at it again this morning. The engine is pretty hard to turn by hand. I'm guessing its pretty nasty inside.

 

[FenderHead]

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ke5aux wrote:

Went at it again this morning. The engine is pretty hard to turn by hand. I'm guessing its pretty nasty inside.

Did you try draining the oil & checking the filter element? There might be some clues there. Run a magnet over the filter element and thru the drain oil to see if ferrous metal is present. If so, it could mean valve train or transmission problems. If there is coolant/water present, you'll see it in the form of milky oil and/or heavy sludge. What year is the other bike?

You could remove the valve covers also, to get a peek at the interior status. I don't know how you'd test compression if it won't crank well, but all the plugs should be out for that test...just the gage fitting should be installed for each cylinder being tested, with throttle wide open and the kill switch off. Then crank it over until the pressure stops climbing.

You might try squirting a little penetrating oil or clean motor oil into the cylinders to see if the engine frees up some. If it does, there's likely some gum-up issues in the cylinders. If you know anyone with a flex-shaft borescope you could borrow, you could get a good visual inside thru the drain plug hole, spark plug holes, filler hole, etc.

Your work is laid out for you...good luck! :waving:

 

[ke5aux]

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I already drained the cooland and the oil. Neither seemed bad. The wing is a 80'.

I'm going to get the valvecovers off next.
The compression test is not possible because the starter does not have enough power to crank the engine over unless all of the plugs are out. Even then it struggles.

 

[redwing52]

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I am sort of thinking the cylinder walls are corroded and making the pistons bind in the bore. I am betting you won't need a compression gauge. Just a finger in the spark plug hole will net the same results. Sometimes lots of free spinning and penetrating oil will half cure this problem but most times the results are not too good. Do you know anyone that has an inspection scope you could look inside the spark plug hole for the cylinders condition? Easier than taking the heads off. Good luck.