No spark to plugs

Hi all,
I hope no one is near their computer and instead is out barbecuing with the fam. But just in case there are some other losers out there who forgo all of that fun three-day-weekend-normal-person stuff and instead opt to try to fix their motorcycle, I thought I'd give this a shot.
My 1982 XJ650J won't start. I use it every day for my short commute to work. It started flooding and not running right early in the week and got progressively worse. I kept playing with the little knob on the airbox side of the carbs that raises and lowers the idle, thinking that might be it or at least I could get it to run butter until the weekend. But then today it won't start at all. I checked the spark to the plugs and there's nothing. However, and this is where it gets interesting, I can hear a random sound of something sparking when the key is on and the kill switch is on. It happens a few seconds after I turn them both on but it's not happening where the wire connects to the plug. It's under the tank which I believe is where the coils are but it doesn't sound like its right there either. Anyone have a clue? Or can anyone point me to a step by step kinda thing to check out my whole ignition circuit?
thanks, and get back to that barbecue - the kids are hungry!
Scott

 

I'm Canadian, no holiday this weekend

Have you checked your fuses? Perhaps something disconnected under the tank.

If it fires when you let go of the start button, it could be a dying battery. Enough charge to spin the engine, but not enough juice to also throw a big blue spark.

 

I just came to my job where I have access to a printer (it's a ghost town) so I can print out some writeups. I'm going to check the fuses and the strength of the battery too as soon as I get back because interestingly, those were the first two things that popped into my mind this morning when I was mulling it over.
Thanks and I'll post the results as soon as I get somewhere with it.

 

Well I printed out this great write-up http://www.xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic ... rcuit.html and although I didn't do it step by step, one of the steps I did, seems to indicate a problem but I'm not really sure. Maybe I'm misreading. I tested the resistance between spark plug wire ends 1 & 4, and then between 2 & 3. But the meter doesn't do a thing. It shows some resistance or zero resistance on everything else that I checked. I set the needle to 20K because the resistance is supposed to read about 11K. Still nothing. And the meter is not blown. It works on everything else that I measure. But the write up even says that it would be highly unusual for both coils to be bad. Anyone have any idea what I might be doing wrong? This is with the battery out of the bike so there's no current anywhere. That should not matter - correct?
thanks,
Scott