Bonneville America Forums Forums Technical Forums Performance Mods Performance Ignition coils????

Has anyone tried a performance aftermarket ignition coil on their Triumph. I have been staring at my stock coil for a few days now while my tank and fender are getting painted. I have upgraded the rubber lines with stainless steel lines and I keep coming back to that dang ignition coil. I would like to upgrade it but I would like to see if anybody has done so before I venture into the unknow again. I know the stock works fine but like to see if an upgrade can be done. Thanks


Fryguy

Really??? Nobody has delved into upgrading the ignition coil? Or am I just asking a stupid question?


Fryguy

there's no such thing as a stupid question. However i dont know the answer. Probably too new for anyone to have gotten into that area yet. But it would be worth looking into.

Not a stupid question, and I think more than a few people have been exploring this possibility, it's just that it seems that ignition upgrades are one of the few areas that the Aftermarket has left alone for Triumphs. Myself personnally, I've yet to find someone who offers an aftermarket Ignitor or ignition coils for the Air-Cooled Triumphs. Traditional ignition upgrades like Tune-Boys, DynaTeks, and DynaJet Power Commanders, are not available to us, and it doesn't seem like they will be made available anytime soon. The best that can be done is by a Gent Named Jojje in Sweden, he has knowledge to raise the RPM limit and/or alter the timing curve; unfortunately, he can't do business with the U.S. anymore for legal reasons, so even that option is secured to us. Truthfully, I think the only ignition "upgrades" that are available are NGK iridium Spark Plugs (big deal, I know) that some of the on-line shops offer. Maybe in a year or two, the aftermarket will start to cater to the Air-cooled Triumphs.

Thanks Mike. I know there can be a way to upgrade. I don't know what voltage the stock coil puts out. I know I have been messing with fuel delivery and I would like to increase the spark delivery if possible. Theres gotta be somthing out there that will perform. something that will produce 30K volts or so. Time to dive in I guess. Thanks


Fryguy

Since these electromagical ignition systems are so touchy, it isn't likely that anyone will fool with it untill someone makes a coil special built for Triumphs. Back in the days of real ignition systems, you could swap out the coil, ride a bit and check the points. If metal was moving from one contact to the other, you changed to the next bigger or smaller condensor, depending on which way the metal was moving. Now, too much or too little DC resistance, reluctance or inductive feedback and it costs you a fortune and a nice long wait by the side of the road.

Yeah, the touchy electrics could be a problem. I'm banking on the fact that Triumphs digital ignition is not that far off from other digital ignitions. I am going to check the resistance of the coils tomorrow to see what I get. I know a few companies make universal coils for either electronic ignition or points based ignition. The resistance of those are usually either 3-ohm or 5-ohm. Going to see what I get and I'll take it from there. Thanks Greybeard


Fryguy

Hey if you figure out an idiot-proof upgrade, share with the collective eh?? 'Trons are usually something that I leave alone. DynaTek has some really nice looking coils, but they seem more oriented to work off their Dyna 3000 ignitor, than with a factory ignitor :-(

Yeah Dyna does make a nice coil. Accel has a nice universal high performance coil but I need to find out what the resistance is on our stock coil.

Fryguy

If ou have a voltmeter, see if you can work out whether the module side of the coils is grounded between sparks or during the spark pulse. There is a huge difference in the coil design between the two designs. A normally on (grounded) system will have a larger core in the coil to store a lot of magnetic energy. Using this type of coil on a system that uses the momentary ground method will deliver a poor spark and cause enough delay to throw off the timing.

Yes, I am going to throw the multimeter on there but I was looking for a starting point. You certainly gave that to me. I should look whether the coil is grounded between sparks or during the spark pulse? This will give me what type of system it is, right?


Fryguy

Coming out of the discussion on flattack.com, I asked about any performance upgrades that might trickle down to us. I got a reply back from somebody at D&D Cycles out of Pensacola(?), Fla who are getting support from Triumph on building a flat tracker to race on the AMA Grand National circuit.

The guy who replied said to contact D&D Cycles at 850-456-0354 or Brent. It might not be long before we see things like performance coils, and ignition boxes.

That would be very nice. It just makes sense that if we are upgrading the cc's, carbs, rejetting, etc. I would like to bump up the spark side of things as well.

D&D in Pensacola is the Dealership where I bought my Speedmaster; the last time I was there getting my fork springs changed out, the owner mentioned that he had sourced a single modified ignitor from Triumph via some Electronics Guru in England. This ignitor was going to be used on some race bike that they were building up for Daytona, but the last time I called (a few weeks back for a question on an ignitor thread) the owner did not seem optimistic for being able to get large quantities of these modified ignitors.

Yeah I don't think anything is going to come out of Triumph Inc in the way of changing the rev limiter. It's unrealistic to think they'd give their stamp of approval for something that could possibly hurt joe customer's motor and longevity. I was hoping they'd find a company on this side of the pond that specializes in that sort of thing to provide a new ignitor box.

Somebody from D&D posted at flattrack.com that the heads were off their flat track bike at the shop, and it sounded like it was from the rev limiter set high enough to cause damage to their bored and stroked race bike.

I would hope for the same in regards to a domestic aftermarket company stepping up to the plate to provide support for this particular blend of hopping up. The problem as I see it, as that as we much as we love these bikes, we don't make up the dominant percentage of cruisers in the U.S. Market, the aftermarket pecking order in my admittedly limited experience seems to be 1) Harley 2) Big Four Japanese 3) Triumph / Victory 4) BMW, or something to that effect. As I understood it from the owner at D&D (because I can tell you, he'd definitely be interested in marketing hopped-up ignitors) the original ignitor came from Triumph to support whatever racing project D&D was running, and they (the dealership) weren't especially interested in having the thing allow much over 8500 or so RPM. I think with stock rods, rod bolts, and valve springs, 8500 would be as fast as anyone would want to spin these babies. Anything over that, and we may as well lay down $2000 for a set of Carrillo rods with ARP rod bolts and find dual valve springs that can work with these heads; or just buy a 955.

Yeah, that's why I had no interest in upping the rev limiter on my bike. I remember Jojje posting that the Speedmasters had a 7900 or 8000 rpm rev limit setting, despite what your tach might indicate. He had tested it on a Speedmaster box that somebody had sent to him. So I figured I wouldn't want to go more than 8,500 rpm for the reasons you stated, and a boost of 500 rpm wasn't going to be worth the $200 or so it would cost.

Now there are some Bonneville owners who have big bore kits and rev limiters set to as high as 8,900 rpm from what I've read. So far I haven't heard of anybody having a mechanical breakdown as a result of their mods. Of course these mods are fairly new, so an extensive longevity test hasn't really occured over a significant number of bikes to see just how mechanically strong those motors are.

But I don't think it's all that relevant about buying a Daytona or a new Speed Triple if you want that kind of performance. A lot of guys buy these bikes just as a hobby and like to mod them out as part of that hobby. Some aren't THAT concerned with reliability and are willing to push the design limits to the maximum. I say more power to them as I find it all an interesting read, and I'm sure they're having fun doing all of this. I just don't have pockets that deep to afford that level of play time. I need the reliability, and I'd just like to see how long my basically stock bike will go before needing a rebuild. That's when I'll put in a big bore kit, but hopefully that won't be until the odometer rolls over past 100k miles. Yup, I plan on having this bike for a long, long time.