"The Natural Philosopher" wrote in message ...
Its an oldy, but apperas to have bags of compression. Simply was in use,
left up for a winter a couple of years ago, never started since.

Its a ltllet 2-0stroke japanese engine - probably about 25cc or so and I
can;t see any spark - the pllug smells of petrol and we even dribbled
some mix into teh p[lug hole, to no avail.

I whipped off the pull handle and discovered something I hadn't seen
since me dads moped curca 1960. A magneto and some contacts. I adjusted
the gap so it was at least closed some of the time and open some of the
time, but still no visible sparks. I removed the wire off the switch
that stops the thing in case this was faulty, and still no sparks.

First of all, is there some way I can identify that there really are no
sparks? I stuck a car strobe light in series with the plug, but I think
this runs off the LT side of the car not the HT...so probably proves
nothing.

Its been years since I fiddled with a magneto, but ISTR that if there is
fuel and a spark these things generally kick a bit and fire if not run.
This ones doing neither.

Is it down to thimgs like stripping out the points and claening them up?

Is there anyway I can use an analogue multimeter to diagnose the problem?



Make sure that the points actually electrically close.

mrcheerful