Saving Old Seagulls

Was pondering the costs of replacement coils & avalability. Why not use a whipersnipper CDI coil & fit to a modified Wipac E core after sliding the faulty one off & fitting a Ryobi CDI. The following pictures are how it was done. First pics are dismantling the Ryobi coil, the ground conection on the assy was carefully chiseled of the E core. The ground tab will need a lead soldered to it for grounding, disregard the pushon term as its for a stop button (unles you reqire that feature) Also the Wipac center part will need grinding down to 10MM square to fit the CDI coil. These Whipersnippers I pick up from the local scrapman for nothing remove the coils & return the rest to the scrappy, havent found a crook coil yet.

Next step is to lengthen the HV cable, carefully solder joint fill with neuteral cure silicone & cover with a few layers of heat shrink tubing. Fit to base, the points are nolonger req.

I have tried this on my FP & it works, But the timing is only about 5deg BTDC, so i shifted the base plate to advance it. The markings are aprox how far it needed to be shifted.

Wondering if this might be a cheap fix for faulty Wipac CDI units.

Daryl that sounds like it's running at the starting timing position, check the polarity of the flywheel magnets, are they the same way around?

Hi Charles, First 2 pics are where fly wheel is in relation to the white spot when it fires, with Wipac coil & points. Have marked where N & S poles of the magnet are. 2nd pics are where flywheel is when the Ryobi module fires, its a little retarded, so when i ran it I shifted the base plate.

This is a pic of the Ryobi whipersniper & its ign coil as originaly fited. Dont know what model it is as there is no model on it.

Thanks for that Manifold, could you label the polarity of those magnets

That is the point Pistonbroke, These small motors i suspect are made from one factory & different brand names put on them, as ive seen several brand names & they are all the same engines. Yes they are all throw away @ $100 to $135 Australian, people here throw them out if they dont work. Most get thrown out due to carby problems, $12 carby kit fixes them. Surely there is Scrap places in the UK, or garage sales. I have picked up Seagull motors only suitable for parts from the Scrap man for free. Have people lost the art of scrounging parts & fixing things?

Here Here Daryl,
When one restores or rebuild one of the older motors one tends to find as many bits at the smallest cost. I like your thinking with the ryobi parts. Well done. It will be interesting how much spark one of these units can produce.