So I still have not managed to get this pony motor to work how it has in the past. I have played with the carb high speed screw, has only maybe one hour on the spark plugs and leads. It gets plenty of fuel, sometimes I wonder if too much but if I dial the high speed screw in it starts to fall off. I am wondering about the magneto timing/ quality of spark. This tractor is a 5T and has the Eismann mag. The service manual says it should be able to jump 1/4" to ground and it does that no prob. Does that single test infact validate that quality is not the issue? I checked the gap, set it to .020" as specified, cleaned the rotor, contacts, cap, brushes etc...I tried adjusting the internal timing of the unit using the procedure in the manual of using a .098" drill shank butted in the slot through the base of the mag. Is there a more up to date way to do this? Also, when I roll the pony so the MAG mark on the flywheel is at the very top (in line with marker on block), the "M" mark inside the peephole behind where the mag mounts is not visible. I thought it should be visible to match to the "M" on the mag gear but it is not unless I roll the crank over further to the "0" mark. Sorry this is a fair bit of run on. Basically, I am wanting to know what is the best way to check mag internal timing and confirm ignition timing and quality is spot on. All I could get today was a number of backfires out the carb and it never ran. This simple little unit is really humbling me. All help is greatly appreciated.

Backfires out of carb often means you need to swap the plug leads on the magneto cap. It is firing a the end of the exhaust stroke when the inlet valve has opened. Simply swapping the leads will rectify the problem, best part is it is easy to do. cheeers WF

I would update to a newer mag, those old eyesmans are hard to get parts for. Check timing and reset carb adjustments.

Sounds like you've addressed every possible problem except the timing marks not lining up. I've had to do the plug wire swap on one and it turned out the gear was actually marked wrong, but I think that is very rare. I would go back and check actual timing of the gears, piston position, and valve train to verify mechanical timing then che k and set the magneto from there. To me the marks not lining up is a big red flag and something is not right. Start at the beginning and don't assume anything. You might be able to make it run by tweaking this and that but when you become a real seasoned collector and have 15 d4 cats you just might not remember what the tweaking was. Good luck Nathan, its a big ocean lots of floundering to be done 😀

Hi Team,to get the best out of an Eisemann I take the mag cap off and set a piece of 1/16 oxy welding wire for example by a loop in one end of the wire via one of the mag cap screws to the mag body so the free end is 1/8" or so away from the coil tang to watch the quality of spark as I slowly turn the mag.I then proceed to simply turn the drive back and forth at the position where the points open--just before the points open you will feel a resistance of the magnetic field being cut by the armature and short few degrees later the points should open--the edge gap you adjusted with the spacer drill sets this gap--I proceed to adjust the points plate adjuster(edge gap adjuster) and watch how slow I can turn the mag to get a spark to jump from the wire to the coil tag.I adjust the edge gap until I get the best spark at the slowest speed in the direction of rotation and lock it up and retest.Taught to me by an older Tradesman when I was an Apprentice at the Dealer in the early 1960's.If you have a later model carby on your pony then be aware of the trap that with the main jet adjust screw it works via a 90* bell crank that gets bent if the main jet screw is over tightened inwards to do the initial main jet setting and so causes the main jet to be lean so requiring some choke to run the pony at full tilt.Cheers,Eddie B.

Thank you all for the pointers. Ed, I am impressed by all these tricks of the trade that you've accumulated and share here. I will try to figure that out. I also have a Bosch mag off my 7U that works. I have to trade one brush back and forth as one broke. My 5T carb does not use the bell crank style main jet screw. I do remember you sharing that recently and I do keep it in mind. I have two other carbs like that. I find that style a PITA. The little fork never wants to let the needle go and of course the bending issue. Why did they go that direction? Just curious...Is it actually a superior design?

another tip that works with all magnetos on any machine. is clean those mating faces spotless they need to be bare metal and absolutely clean to give the best spark once cleaned take a 2B pencil and rub the graphite all over both the mating faces gently blow off excess graphite and reassemble the graphite improves the return path to the magneto boosting the spark.
i had to swap the leads on our pony as we had them arse about.

Well I finally got to tinkering with my Eismann mag. Eddie, I tried your method out. Or at least I hope I have done it correctly. I have one end of a 16ga wire grounded to the body and the other end I hold 1/8" or more away from the coil tang. I found it somewhat difficult to distinguish when the arc would jump best with a slow rotation of the mag gear but I adjusted the breaker plate as best as I could and we will find out how I did tomorrow. I didn't really want to fire it up at 9:30 in the evening.

I had a few other findings that have me curious. Something seems off. When I rotate the pony flywheel so MAG is at the very top lined up with the marker, the M mark on the cam gear is not visible in the 3/8 NPT peephole. Regardless, I installed the mag with the scribe mark on the distributor gear lined up with the timing mark pointer inside the small opening. Now when I rotate the pony flywheel normal rotation, it comes to where the 0 mark is at the top position and at that point the M on the cam gear and the M on the mag gear are in mesh inside the 3/8 plug hole, but then of course the scribe mark on the distributor gear is not lined up with the pointer. I would have thought that the MAG mark, both M marks, and the scribe mark would all be in position but this is not the case. Does this seem off? Of course I will find out if it runs any better tomorrow. I found my AB6 plug gaps were a little generous so I closed them to .020, mag points are .020". We will see...

With MAG mark in vertical position on flywheel