86 VF500 with no spark from one coil pack

Hello guys and probably gals, Please excuse my ignorance to this bike. I have ridden motorcycles since being a kid and worked on them as well but this one is really different. I inhereted a 86 VF500 from my brother. He told me it had a problem with no spark to the front cylinders. Ok I pulled the tank off and well DUHH the coil pack was gone. I obtained a good used coil pack and installed it. Connected the wires which do have power to them and stil no spark to the wires. Any ideas? PLEASE...It seems as though from looking through the threads these bikes are trouble prone but they must be awesome to ride as people are going thru He.. to get them going. Any help would be appreciated.

 

Well sadly not one suggestion from this forum led me to experiment. I have determined that one of the CDI boxes letter b is no good. Maybe someone will have the courtesy to help with this question. What year boxes will interchange. There are a ton of 82-84 boxes on E-bay at reasonable prices. it appears 86 and 87 have the same number. Honda wants 427 dollars per box which even had the parts guy laughing at how stupid that price was. The plugs on the earlier boxes look the same but I know that doesnt really mean they will work. Could anyone help with info?? PLEASE???

 

Before concluding it's the CDI, do a resistance test on the pulse generator for that circuit.

 

I actually switched the boxes onm the plug in sockets. Then the other bank fires . obviously the coil is fine. One box will fire either set so logic tells me it's the box. THANK YOU for at least chiming in. I need all the help I can get. My biggest question is which years will interchange. 82-85 boxes are cheap. 86-87 boxes are spendy. I dont want to mix and match as I understand this may control ignition timing and I dont want one bank runnig at the wrong specs. God if this was my alcohol blower motor this would be easy. but motorcycles are tyuly a challenge in this late model computer controlled stuff.

 

NEW VF 500..... simmer down booboo..... the time from your first post to you second post is only a couple of hours.... this forum is cool but its not staffed 24-7....

any way to check for compatibilty, check your honda manual...you have one right? thats a first..... then did you ohm out the cdi Box? and make sure its not working? check all wires going into the CDI box as wella s the connections.... make sure you have a good connection befoer you spend money.... the bike is 25+ years old, so its a good chance that you may have a bad connection......

good luck and scour the forums in the 1st gen- 2nd gen section...for more information.

 

This is something that happens. You'll want to keep an eye on eBay for another spark box and hope that it works! In a pinch an 84-85 part would work, just keep in mind that the ignition advance is slightly different. I doubt you would notice the difference though. The earlier ones also have a higher rev limit, but I suggest manually observing a 9000rpm rev limit to prevent dropped valves anyway.

Good luck!

 

A HUGE THANK YOU to the guys that have gave suggestions. I apologize for my crappy attitude and please know it wasnt directed at anyone. I really hate electrical gremlins as they are not my forte. Thanks again