Hello,<br /><br />Being the resident mechanically inclined guy, I've been working on a friend's pontoon boat recently, and I had a few questions. We recently re-wired the entire craft without a hitch, and after some toying around, we got the engine up and running. The boat had been sitting for 7 months in a marina without being touched (not really his fault; long story). Anyways, I'm more used to 4-stroke car engines than boat motors, so this is a new experience for me.<br /><br />The boat has a '77 Johnson 85 HP outboard. After connecting a new fuel line and bulb and putting in fresh gas, it turned over and seemed to run, albeit a little rough. It looks like there was some recent work done on the engine. There are three new coils installed, and it looks like someone wrote the compression numbers on the cylinder heads (none under 115). Anyways, to cease the rambling, here are my questions:<br /><br />The plug wires looked a little beat up (cracked insulation, burn marks on the ends), so we replaced the ones coming from the new coils (more on that in a moment). This was an immediate improvement; the engine ran a lot smoother. We could not replace the cord on the old coil, since it seemed to be fixed in place on the coil and could not be removed. The engine still seems to "hiccup" occasionally at idle; should we replace this coil? There's spark at the gap, but it looks a little weak. Also, when replacing the plug wires, I just picked up a set of 4-cylinder automotive silicone-insul wires and used three from there. Will this work ok, or am I going to run into trouble later? The original configuration was simply solid core wires pushed onto the post on the coil and then butted up against the top of the spark plug; there were no "snap" connectors on the plug ends at all. I read an earlier post that said the resistance from non-solid-core plug wires might be too high for these coils, so I want to make sure I'm not headed for trouble. For what it's worth, it seems to be working fine with these wires at the moment.<br /><br />My next question is: Just how should this engine run? It seems to be running OK, but with little experience in this area, I'd like to be sure. Out of the water with the water muffs on, it idles at around 1100 RPM and sounds like some sort of monstrous lawnmower. In the water it idles around 900 or so and is relatively quiet except for a persistent exhaust "lull" (think Harley Davidson) at idle; this makes me suspect that there may be an ignition problem on one of the cylinders. If I open it up straight out on open water, it tops out at 3900 RPM. Is this normal behavior?<br /><br />Sorry for the really long post, any advice is appreciated. Thanks!<br /><br />-Jay
.<br /><br />Thanks for the advice so far. This is a great board. 
