When sparking becomes arcing...

[Supercoyote]

So I've been trying to hunt down why I have arcing on my points, but I realized today I don't know if small sparks are ok. Should I see any light coming off the points while the bike is running? Before I've had big yellow sparks, but now I have small blue sparks that resemble a very weak spark plug. I assume there shouldn't be anything at all? Or is it impossible to have a perfect contact through the points without any light being given off in the form of sparks/arcs?

 

[drewpy]

the condensor elimates arcing, otherwise yout contacts will spark erode away in a very short time

 

[Supercoyote]

So, should there be any visible light off the points, no matter how minimal?

 

[drewpy]

describe minimal?

 

[Supercoyote]

I'd the lights are all off, you can see small blue sparks appear. Not shooting off laterally like when they're dirty, but a consistent, blue spark less than the size you'd see on a healthy set of spark plugs

 

[MerlinDudley]

It sounds very much like your condenser, is US (Unserviceable) and should be replaced a.s.a.p! If you don't, you will be replacing your pitted points, at regular intervals!

Merlin

 

[Supercoyote]

To bring closure to this:

Don't use generic resistor-less plug caps. I threw on the old plug caps for fun and the sparking disappeared entirely. Strange, since I had 5k ohm resistor plugs, but I don't know what the specs are for the old plug caps, so there's that.