coil

[dwilliams]

I have a new 6V coil for WL and was wondering how to put the spark plug leads into coil. Do you heat the coil in oven then stick them in?

[Rockin Ronny O]

My dad taught me a neat trick to heating up a 6-volt coil. Install the coil to your bike and wire it all in. Turn on your ignition switch and it should heat up enought to push your plug wire into the "goo" inside. If after a few minutes with your ignition switch on and the coil doesn't heat up (you can tell by touching the outside of the coil) then you need to rotate your engine until the points close (or was it open...I forget) and try it again. This method sure beats putting the coil in a pot of hot water to heat it like some manufacturers suggest.

[Rub]

Only heat up the coil when replacing the wires, not if it never had wires. If the coil is heated without wires the tar inside will fill the holes and you will never get wires in it. You can clean the holes out with a piece of tubing with saw teeth filed in it that fits snugly in the wire hole. Oil the end of the cable and round it slightly so it will push in and not catch in the tar. Make sure the wire strands are exposed and folded back in a sunburst pattern.There is a post down inside that needs to make good contact with the wires in the cable in order to work. The cable must be stranded wire, not silicone wires for modern systems. This applies to OEM H-D type 6V square coils. Not sure what type you are using? Hope this helps. Robbie

[dwilliams]

again thanks everyone. But I was hasty in seeking advice. My coil is a repro and I just received it, it has prongs in which you poke wire into, so thank you very much anyway always appreciate any input and who knows one day I may use a stock coil and will know what to do now.

[partshunt]

Clip a battery charger across the coil primary terminal, (breaker lead removed), set for six volts, ignition off to warm up the coil. 20 30 minutes is all you need. Save the battery, you mite wanna start it up after to check your work, panheads can be hard starting as is let alone a weakend battery.....Joe

[charlie frey]

I've gotten some disagreement on this one, but I can tell you from experience...I used to sell a lot of those repop square coils, and a lot of them went tits up until a guy with much more experience than myself told me to stop wiring the stoplight switch to the coil.
Never lost one after that.

[partshunt]

Hi Charlie:- Experience is Golden and I repect that, now do you mean you disagree with warming up a coil with a battery charger? Or, do you mean wiring the stop lite switch to the points side of the coil? That would be an error. However, the original wireing has the hot wire to the coil also hooked up to the stop lite switch on terminal 41 of the seat post junction block six inches from the coil terminal same hot wire. Also, the coil feed (ignition hotwire ) originates at the junction terminal 6 to the right of the speedo. This # 6 terminal is also the take off for all other ignition on circuits, What am I missing here because I dont see an adverse effect if some one was too lazy to hook up the stop swicth under the coil and just go to the hot side of the coil itself, chopper style, its the same circuit??? Help me please...Joe

[charlie frey]

The comment about the stop switch was just an aside to help you keep your bike running.
Also...remember...both plugs always light. If half you coil dies, you can splice the HT wires together and get home.
I think heating the coil with a battery charger is fine, but it's a moot point with a repop coil with no goo in it.
As for your wiring question...actually....I can't remember where I used to hook up those switches...I see what you mean about it being in the same circuit whether it's right on the coil or not.
Maybe something about capacitanc/resistance in the wires if the switch has some wire between it and the coil. I'm not much with electronics...I just wire 'em up.
All I remember for sure was that when I moved that wire, the problems stopped...and it was always that side of the coil that went out (on my way to Laconia!).
Hey...maybe it was a bad batch of coils and the problem was fixed when I switched the wiring!