Coil failure

Q. I recently had to replace the ignition coil for 1 and 4. I’ve heard about quite a few Kawasakis having ignition coil problems. Has Anyone had ignition coils go bad on them as a reoccurring problem?

A. I had a 89 ZX7 that the coil #@%**ed out on around 12,000 miles. Left me stranded as the #’s 1,4 cylinder wouldn’t run. Been acting intermittent for a while and was worse when it heated up.

I have done a lot of Dyno testing on stock and aftermarket Coils, Plug wires, plugs etc. I have yet to find a aftermarket coil that makes more power than stock. I have used Dyna’s gray coils, 2.2 ohm, but I don’t like these. The use conventional type car plug wires that don’t work well with the stock plug caps. The stock plug caps are designed to twist on tightly to a hard connection. These soft aftermarket wires don’t work as well. They also eliminate in some cases the stock cap all together. The resulting interference to my Shift light is unacceptable once the stock “resistor 5000 ohm caps” are eliminated.

They also make so much excess “stray” voltage, they fire to ground sometime. I had the lights out in my shop one night and could see them fire a bolt of lightning right through the rubber boot on the plug wire connection to the valve cover. This was on the coil end of the wire with everything tight and brand new.

To sum this up, I stick with stock plug wires, coils and caps. Currently using this on my Turbo motor and on my Nitrous motors with no failures.

I did however replace my coils on my 92 7, as a precautionary measure, though they were working OKAY at the time. AGE and Heat were the reason.

I think coil failure is pretty rare, but does happen.

Ken

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