124 Followed Me Home

[JSlezak83]

Knocking the dust off this. I ordered parts to refresh the clutch, but haven’t gotten to it yet. Last week I pulled the head to repair leaking head gasket. I resurfaced the head, a new Kohler gasket and reassembled. Ran the engine a few times to heat cycle and retorque bolts. Now when opening throttle, the engine misfires badly and belches black smoke.

I’m guessing the newfound compression is blowing out the spark, as this was not an issue prior to removing the head. It did have an occasional pop through the exhaust before, and timing was a little jumpy when checked with a timing light. I’ll check the coil, but it seems they can still fail within range. The points look a little crusty too, so I’ll have to clean that up. Is there a way to test the condenser, rather than just throwing parts at it?

The Walbro 52 that was on there when I bought it had a leaking float, so that went in a box. I’ve been running a China carb for now, but have a nice Kohler 26 to rebuild.

After some house updates, I’ve got new pins and bushing for the drive plate. New pins for the pressure plates, and a new clutch disc and teaser spring. I need to squeeze the axle channel while the motor is out for the clutch. How tight should the drive pins be in the disc. The new pins seem a little sloppy, so I’m worried I’ll just tear up the new disc.

Anyhow, I fix one thing and 3 more pop up. The bottom of the steering gear blew out over the winter. I’m guessing there was some ice in there that cracked the casting. Overall, not too bad for a neglected 55 year old machine.

[JSlezak83]

I tested the coil yesterday. The primary side showed about 1.9ohm. I’m assuming there are a few windings shorted. The secondary side was within spec. Maybe this weekend I’ll try the coil from my 1200 to see if that clears up the misfire, before throwing parts at it.

[finsruskw]

You need "spirol" pins for the drive plate, not hardware store roll pins.

[JSlezak83]

Yep, bought them from a site sponsor.

[JSlezak83]

I had a few minutes to mess with the 124 today, so I looked at the coil again. The negative post had some stripped threads, and I couldn’t really tighten the points or condenser leads. Upon closer inspection there were 2 split lock washers. I ditched those and found enough good threads to tighten those wires. Fired it up, and it revs cleanly again. Should I be at all concerned with the 1.9ish ohm reading on the secondary windings? Will that burn up the points quicker?

[R Bedell]

Should I be at all concerned with the 1.9ish ohm reading on the secondary windings?

Normal resistance on a Kohler Ignition Coil secondary, is 7000 to 12000 ohms. Primary is 4-8 ohms.

[JSlezak83]

Guess I had primary/secondary reversed. What I was calling secondary was actually the primary windings. Actual secondary side checked out at around 9000 ohm.