blowit

Hey Tyler! I really didn't stop in to whine and cry, just stopping in to say hi to all the Banshee die hards! I think you hit the nail on the head though regarding "cheap Banshee owners". It is a fact the Banshee has been out of production a long time, so people now see it as cheap horsepower....key word....'cheap'..... There is nothing wrong with that, but the pennies just got tighter and tighter. But as a point of reference that might help people understand, most billet impeller shafts are being made with TG&P bar. That is "turned, ground, polished". That is basically a long rod that is 'centerless ground'. Because other features need machined, they used a softer bar so they could actually machine it, and the word "stainless" in many people's mind means "better".....In many applications, it is NOT! Anyone buying or making 'stainless' head bolts? No..... and there is a reason. In my career, I want to make the 'best', not 'cheaper than the other guy'. The OEM impeller shaft works just fine! The issue was that plastic head, and for several reasons. Some here might recall that we started building a replacement press-on impeller head to save the customer money. The problem was we had a massive influx of calls asking for a shaft because their aftermarket one was toast. So we dug in. What we came up with was the right solution IMO. I am not going to detail how we do anything, but that shaft was about 10x more wear resistant, and 3x stronger than any stainless shaft, plus it was center ground, so concentricity was on point. There were probably about 10x steps and several processes to make that shaft, compared to China's ONE. In hind sight, we maybe should have focused on 'cheaper', but I don't like call backs or failures. We had many side covers inhouse to try to predict the OEM tolerances, but we wanted that pump running tight for a reason. There was actually (still is) a rev2 on the books....where it will stay. In short, we can move WAY more water. But as an aside, China is continuing to destroy America and I don't think people really see it. They steal and copy technology daily. Then sell it right back to the people they stole from! I could write pages of documented theft from the biggest corporations in America! If you won't send them a print, they will hack your company files and get prints that way! Going WAY beyond our silly Banshee parts, China is working to disassemble America. They are doing it with TikTok and other platforms as well as continuously steal. What I suspect happened with our drive gear is a guy up North thought he would be smart and send one to China. They hacked out some copies for him, followed shortly by parts direct from China. There is a reason we will NEVER send our stuff to China. This the scam that people don't understand. But anyway, merry Xmas bishes!!!😁 B

Has that become questionable on them? I think China picked those up but I have not personally inspected one yet. I did see one made in the states (I think), and looked like angry beavers made it, but I didn't measure anything.

No, unfortunately we are not currently selling any ATV parts. And Mac is one of our copycats. I could tell you things I very much don't like about their manufacturing, but that would just be helping them...lol Sadly, we had an extremely innovative Banshee head we wanted to bring to you guys.

Hey guys, some of you guys likely remember us. We designed and manufactured several innovative products for the Banshee platform. We are still around, still making parts, but we got bit with the "copy cat" deal, and ultimately China. A few guys up in the Northern states decided to take a dive in trying to make our parts. They chased inferior but cheaper methods, and ultimately sent some parts to China to get made, not realizing how China works. China LOVES to make yow pahts because they get prints and design data, and it only took a few months before China was selling them directly in the USA.... Yes, we mostly had to shut phones down because we were getting too many calls about product issues and they were not even our parts! I don't have time for that BS! No, we are far from out of business, but we simply had to walk away from this space for now. We lurned.... There are a lot of people that want to bash your product, then go try to copy it. I guess it comes with the business but I think we need to stick with engineered components where most copycats can't walk. But enough with the rant there, most everyone we dealt with in the Banshee space, including Mr. HQ Tyler, has been super to work with! I can still mostly put a Banshee together blindfolded, but some of you have me beat! We really enjoyed finding unique problems that needed solved and you guys were part of that story! I am not saying we won't return, but if we do, it will be quite different. I guess part of getting away from this space is not being in contact with our customers that bought our parts! I take that part serious and we are still trying to figure a way to open a channel for those folks. But I know we worked to make quality products that last, not make the cheapest, so hopefully those parts are still out winning races. B

make sure slides are in correctly. Common for people to get them on the wrong sides. Cut way on bottom goes towards the filters.

Pull the flywheel and see if the key is sheared. If you recently had the flywheel off, it is common to not get it tight enough and it will slip. Do NOT use Ether in these engines. If you want to test, use carb cleaner. With a quick spritz in the carbs, the engine should at least try. If not, timing may be a factor. Brandon Mull Engineering

Yes indeed! The parking brake switch is located on the clutch perch and if not adjusted properly, will not close all the way and cause what you are experiencing. You will want to either adjust the parking brake or unplug the brake switch to prevent this. Brandon Mull Engineering

The OE system in a Banshee is a regulator only and stays AC. Typically for LED lights you will either need DC conversion or some lights have internal DC rectifiers. Running an LED on AC is not a good idea. For AC, you will want to stay with resistive lights like OE Halogens.

I think before going too extreme, I would disconnect the regulator AND all the lights and see what voltage is produced. Without a regulator, the voltage will fluctuate with rpm but should run up to 30V or more. If you are still only seeing 2-3V, ensure the ground and leads are good. It is possible that the regulator is shorted to ground and dumping all your power to chassis.

This sounds like it should be a pretty obvious issue that should stand out. Emphasis needs to also be on flatness of the top deck of the cylinders. I have never been a fan of having two separate cylinders with a common cylinder head but thats what we got. I might recommend to obtain some Persian Blue or equivalent from a parts store and put a very light film on the head without the gasket and torque 5ftlb. Then loosen and remove head straight up without sliding it around. Look at the contact on the head and cylinders to determine where the issue is. I have seen where two different base gaskets were used or the locating dowels are not placed on the cylinder bases. The missing dowels can cause the cylinders to be out of place and cause misalignment once the head is torqued. A proper precision straight edge can also be used on the top of the cylinders and use a .001" feeler gauge to determine if there is an issue. I do not recommend tightening the head before the base nuts as if things are note aligned, the base can develop a leak. Brandon Mull Engineering

My comment about grounding in this post is a mere generality and example. However, the secondary of a Banshee coil does indeed generate 5k-7k volts. As well, the stator ignition coil can generate AC voltage in excess of 70V. I am NOT saying you will receive a shock, this is more about applying redundancies to protect sensitive circuits. The CDI is considered a solid state device in which the I/Os will have a peak voltage/amperage threshold, and then fail. What becomes interesting with AC voltage is is can "stack" or amplify in a return or back voltage. This is why there is resistance in the secondary spark circuit...to prevent back voltage from returning to the primary and back to the CDI. If the back voltage is in phase with another back voltage event, the voltage can far exceed the rated back voltage of the device. In a nut shell, it is always a good idea to ensure grounded things all have the same 0V potential so there is not a build up of voltage. I am not implying Yamaha doesn't know what they are doing, and the Banshee system works when operating properly. But what if the secondary voltage leaks for some reason? You don;t want that stray voltage to end up in the stator coil, in which the insulation is not rated for that, and most certainly the input of the CDI would not handle it either. You want to ensure that voltage has a strong alternate reference so it will use that instead. Hopefully some of that makes sense.

If a cable is stretched, someone may have made an adjustment inside the clutch cover, in which you may need to adjust it back for the new cable. Regarding adjustment, it is not really paramount that the arrows line up perfect. What is desired by Yamaha is that the actuator arm is roughly 90* from the line of the cable. Regarding lurching. when a clutch is adjusted properly, you will have a bit of free play at the very end of travel of the bar lever. You NEED that free play. If you have that, pull the lever all the way in, and the bike still wants to creep forward, there are likely clutch issues with the basket or hub. This causes the clutch plates to try to stay in an engaged state. Brandon Mull Engineering

I am sure I went over proper grounding at some point. I will just point out that regardless of if something "works", grounding is many times used for protection of circuits and humans. Solid state circuits can get zapped by stray voltage. I remember a very sharp engineer I worked with that did not understand why I insisted on a safety ground on an AC motor driven machine because it was working just fine. Only 2mo later someone got a nasty shock from that machine because the wiring had made contact with ground and energized the chassis. It is never a bad idea to keep negative/neutral/ground all at the same potential.....0V As to the OP question, I would first be testing the stator performance before anything else, then work forward. As well, IIRC, the CDI only has one kill circuit in which if I remember correct, if the black/white is connected to the black, the CDI will not fire. That should serve as a simple way to verify the CDI is in "on" mode. This works back through the TORS, key switch, and bar switch. On later models, there is an additional "rev limit" circuit for the park brake but will still allow an idle start. Question, I have toyed at the idea of building and offering a plug-in stator/pickup coil tester since a simple ohm meter does not tell the whole story and most people do not have an oscilloscope around. Would that be of interest to anyone?

Sort of doubt timing did all that. Usually the pistons will nuke or head gasket will let go before rods snap. A rod bent in an S is telltale of trying to compress a liquid. You don;t have to drown one to hydrolock. A good mouth full at 10k rpm is all it takes. Hard to say but on the timing, you have to understand there is a spark "curve" and there is initial advance. When you turn the plate, you are increasing initial advance which moves the entire curve up XX*. I think the Dyna can be set up to be just like factory OR add initial advance but otherwise run the factory curve, if that makes sense.

My guess, and only a guess is the engine was likely running and got in some water. Unlikely there was enough energy by dragging the bike to not only bend a rod, but snap another and send it through the case.

If you are trying to test the voltage output at the spark plug, I would be surprised if you have not toasted your meter yet! No DMM is rated for that voltage. Test only the resistance in the wires and coil. If the bike otherwise runs fine, I would not be suspecting spark, but carb sync. This largely affects idle and start performance if one carb is not touching down. Or you may have pilot jet issue. They plug up easily.

I would not go further until you can determine the squish. You already know it exceeds .060", which is a concern. The timing edge of the piston should come up flush with the top deck of the cylinder. If not, there is an issue there.

Did you fix it and is your problem solved? Did you try another CDI?

I assume you mean the clutch "arm". There is a retainer that bolts over that to keep it down. If that is not there, you need one! If that did come up, you may not have success reinstalling without first removing the clutch cover and removing the clutch pressure plate, which will remove any tension on the pushrod. You will need to pull the pushrod and ball back towards the right side so the arm will go in. If you persist in trying to jam the arm down, you may succeed in damaging the bore it rides in. Then you get to do a full teardown. Also, IIRC, I think there may be a soft plug right by the front sprocket that gains access to that bore. You would have to drill/extract/replace that plug but if it is there, you can push the rod back there and reinstall, which would eliminate the need to remove the clutch cover. Brandon Mull Engineering

Your cranking compression value will vary, especially if you have porting. I would highly suspect either the wrong piston, or a comp gauge that is not right. If there is no schrader valve in the threaded tip that goes in the head, the value will NOT be correct and will read low. I would no go throwing smaller domes at the engine to try to get a magic value from a compression gauge. Lets figure out why it is low first! If it is assembled, use solder to test the squish band clearance first. Report back. Brandon Mull Engineering

Keep in mind the spark kernel on a Banshee is small. Do not expect a huge fat spark. You say it did start with Ether. If the engine runs but rough, I would first do a proper carb clean. All your issues may be there. As well, do NOT start a Banshee with Ether. If you need supplemental starting aid, use a sniff of Propane or Carb cleaner. If the bike will start on these, that should tell you this is carb related most likely. brandon Mull Engineering

That right there is largely concerning to me........ Its actually nagging a hole in my head that someone with the word "professional" in there would accept this as correct arithmetic! It ain't right!

Registered is giving accurate advice. We are more a fan of using math than dumping in oil, but it can work the same. Question- Are your piston domes flat or called domes for a reason? IE, that works into the math, and something that needs to be accurate and that data is not published. A 4mm with drag timing exhaust, 21cc dome, and pump fuel is asking for it. This right here is why we recommend users to roll timing back, then bring in timing 1* at a time. For a quick test, you should try rolling your timing back to 0* or even less, and see if you have overrev. Nevermind the math, I see multiple issues here and think just throwing race fuel at it is a reasonable solution for now. Brandon Mull Engineering

If you are talking about moving the top of the piston in the bore, disregard that! Very normal for the crown to be a LOT smaller than the skirts to account the heat expansion.

I think you need to start with a good carb clean and know what you are doing! So far it sounds like possibly some plugged jet issues and needle/seat leaking. Clean carbs and start there.