Loose battery connection, loose connector on the wires harness, open wire intermittently shorting out.

Electrical problems are a pita to diagnose when they're intermittent. Start simple: make sure the battery leads are tight and major connectors are also (ecu, fuel pump, bas, starter relay, etc)

 

Kuroshio has it in his first line ^

That moisture seems to elicit the problem confirms.

About engine seizures: I've only had 2 engines ever 'seize' on me: 1 KTM 550cc 2-stroke, and 1 small block Chevy. Neither of them locked the engine nor the drive wheel(s) tight. That'll never, ever happen unless you break internal parts of the engine in a way that mechanically locks the crankshaft. The engine will just lose power and coast to a halt. How quickly that happens depends upon how much momentum you have going. In a multi-cylinder engine, you'll probably lose more and more power until the engine dies, as it is reasonably likely that you'll only 'seize' a single cylinder first.

 

This makes absoultely no sense whatsoever. If an engine seizes, the piston is locked in the bore. It will lock up the motor and drivetrain. Why do you think all the 2 stroke guys always ride with one finger on the clutch? To be ready to pull it in as to prevent a nasty spill. A seized motor will roll if its in neutral.

On a SBC, you will not just lose power and coast to a halt if you seize a piston. Think about it. That V8 crank shaft drives all the pistons. If one of them stop, they all stop.

 

Not a professional mechanic, but a 'seized' engine just means the piston is out of alignment with the cylinder.. on a moving car this can cause anything from a loud metalic ping to an engine stall, but theres usually enough momentum in the car to prevent the driveshaft lockup you describe. tho once u shut the engine off it wont turn over again

dont know about bikes tho

 

It's a fair bit more terminal than "just" pistons being out of alignment - such
as crapped out bearings , scored cams, cranks and cylinder walls and it takes
a fair amount of neglect and abuse to get an average run motor to do that
in any vehicle.

 

Yeah, you _will_ just lose power and coast to a halt. To repeat myself: The way I know is because I've experienced it, both w/a SBC and with a big-bore 2-stroke bike. The SBC was running 80 mph at the time, and the 2-stroke bike was running ~70 mph when it seized. I think you have a pretty serious misconception of what a seizure is in an engine. dhurley is correct that the engine won't re-start, but the only way you could get the engine to physically lock in a way that instantaneously locks the crankshaft, pistons, and the rest of the drivetrain is to do something along the line of arc welding all the internal engine parts to each other simultaneously. That's not what happens. Even if you break a connecting rod and throw it through the block, what happens is that the block breaks apart.

If a bearing seizes (which means the bearing insert(s)), then the fairly soft insert material spins within the seat surface. This makes a bunch of friction and heat really quickly, which will ultimately melt the bearing insert if there's enough momentum to keep the vehicle moving. If a piston seizes, you'll gall the heck out of the piston skirt and/or the cylinder, but there's nowhere near enough friction to lock the entire drivetrain. A piston seizure is what happened to my KTM. It didn't lock the rear tire, nor even slow me down very much more rapidly than simply closing the throttle.

Even if you suppose that you're rear tire would lock up solidly for some combination of reasons, it wouldn't be any different than stomping on the rear brake. That's not a good thing to do, but it's not like you go flying just because.

 

I dont want to sound like an e-hardass... but you are wrong!! A seized engine is just that. Seized!! Google it and then try and come argue what a sezied engine is. It is NOT pistons being out of alignment, it does not allow you to coast to a stop...

Seriously what is the deal with internet forums these days...

 

On the SBC - what can happen is the torque converter overloads and opens up to save the transmission. It takes a huge amount of resistance to make this happen. I've managed to shift a few automatic transmissions into reverse while in a forward gear before - every time you end up in freewheeling mode. Stop, shut off motor, shift to park, start up and drive away. In your case - the motor can't fire back up.

can't help you with the bike's explanation.

 

I understand, brveagle. Internet searches can be a powerful persuader for those without experience. I'm quite comfortable in my first-hand knowledge of what happens when an engine seizes, so I'll not be referencing Google at this time. Perhaps the difference between the position that you and Google are taking vs. my experience is more semantic than anything else? If so, then fine.

Adrenalinejunky, I agree with you that the TC can fail under the right circumstances. In the case to which I refer, it did not. The replacement engine was bolted to the tranny as-is (as-was), and the truck driven away. The seized engine was just all kinds of ugly. Destroyed bearing inserts, seriously galled journals, galled pistons, scored cylinders, burned/coked oil... it was truly a mess inside. The KTM didn't look very bad. Piston was scuffed pretty good, and the ring was toast, but comparatively speaking it wasn't a big deal, visually. There was that little thing about lack of compression...

I've taken enough bandwidth here trying to explain the misapprehension of a person going flying due to a seized engine, so I'm done.

 

haha, good luck with life man. It amazes me how people refuse to use Google and actually educate themselves on a topic. Instead they choose to rely on first hand mis-information.

For anyone following this thread that actually wants to learn something, check out this article on the differences between scoring and seizing...

http://www.kartsport.org.nz/technica...e_seizures.htm