My 2003 400 Arctic Cat dies after riding it for about 10 minutes. It will not start after for atleast 2 minutes. And will die again when it comes to another stop. It only does this when it gets good and warmed up. Could it be my spark plug? The plug looks fine.

 

not the plug. its one of a possible 3 things. regulator, rectifier, coil. or another thing in your chargeing system...all i know is i have an 01 that does the same thing and it will cost you some serous $'s to get it fixed. mostly because its cheaper for a dealer or mechanic to change each piece rather than check to see if there good or not.

i hate my AC for that reason...its a cronic problem that they still havent fixed in there newer line up.

 

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO...that not what I wanted to hear. Thanks for the help. That really bites! I'll start my quest now. If i figure it out I'll let you know. Thank you.

 

it can be one or more of those things....sorry it sucks, but it taught me to watch what i buy

 

Thanks. Yea this thing has been a real piece every since I got it. Bought it and it had 350 miles on it and was garage kept. Owner mostly putted around on it. I have had nothing but trouble with it. Looks good...but a piece! maybe time to trade it in. Thanks again.

 

Don't give up yet
I have a 2005 AC 500 TBX, it was doing the samething
I changed the fuel, added new fuel with stabil
Added an inline filter
Cleaned the carb of the Cat
Cleaned out all the vent tubes (3)
unplugged and reconnected all the connection points
insulated all the loose wires and retied all under the frame
Installed and gapped a new NGk plug

She runs better than before. Try all the DYI things before you take it to the dealer.

 

Thanks for the support. when I first got this I had a problem with carb. Apparently this thing had never seen 25 mph before. Older couple had it and really just putted around the place on it. When I'd get to about 25 mph it would run out of fuel. So i went threw carb replaced all hoses/filters and cleaned tank...fixed the problem. But the last few weeks I've noticed on the warmer days as the thing really warms up it starts the problems. I only asked about the plug because i had a mower that would run until it got hot. So I replaced the plug and it never did it again. So tomorrow I'm going to try a new plug. I'll let yo know what happens. Thanks again and i'll take your advice and check everything...nothing to loose.

 

the only reason i said rectifier, regulator,coil; was because those are the most likely problems for your model. to be honest i hope it is a simple fix like a loose connection or bad plug. good luck

 

it very well could be the plug do to the fact the other couple putted around on it and if any oil or carbon built up on the plug ,it wont run right. For a few bucks id change the plug first. It says in the manual to change it after 100 miles or 10 hrs and i bet they didnt. I just changed my plug in my 700 yesterday. It has 300 miles on it and the plug they gave me to replace it was a ngk CR6E, it came with a CR8E, manual says CR6E though, kinda confused me. I dont know what the difference is,probaly a little hotter/cooler plug.

 

I would be leanig toward something fuel related or a bad plug. My reasoning is where you stated "it only does it when it gets good and warmed up....after it occurs it restarts after a couple of minutes".

Last time I worked on a machine with a rectifier, coil or CDI issue once it heated up and shut off it was several hours! to cool down before it restarted. Not that one of these isn't the problem jus that it is not matching what I am used to.

Cherokee is right about some mechanics just replacing components like exploratory surgery until the issue goes away with out taking time to further diagnose the issue. Cost the ATV owner $ and saves them time (for them time is $). Some might do this others may not too.

If it were mine I would get a service manual and start with all the DIY things I could. Like clean the carb, air filter, fuel tank, make sure choke worked, check charging voltage, battery voltage, plug color, etc.

I was just given a suzuki Ozark 250 that the owner knew the engine was fried. He was riding it, shut off the engine, came back later to start it and it partially turned over and then stopped with a little screech. He just knew the piston was fried. He gave it to me. I pulled the plug and fuel ran out! Tank was empty but the cylinder and crankcase were completely full of fuel!. I cleaned it out, installed a fuel shutoff valve (old enough to not have one) and it runs like a champ. I was at least nice enough to ride it over to his house and give it back to him, but it was an easy fix. Could have been much worse.

So don't throw inthe towel yet.

SJ