~1986 VRO 40, master fuse?

[Noltz]

Was out enjoying the water this afternoon, pulled into dock to pick up my son, and the entire motor electrical system was completely dead. No click from the prime solenoid, no crank. Having only a small piece of wire with me, I tried jumping the starter terminal (the hot-in-start one) to the heavy lead on the starter solenoid. The engine turned over well, but would not even cough. I suspect the ignition was completely dead too. Engine ran excellent up to this point.

Is there a master fuse on these I don't know about? I just downloaded all the wiring diagrams I can find, and am well versed in electrical, but "KISS" says ask if there's anything simple first

 

[Noltz]

Re: ~1986 VRO 40, master fuse?

Update;
I found some wiring diagrams through this site, and found no power at the master connector under the engine cover. Tracing it back I had power at the bus bar. Poking around for a few minutes I noticed this, which turned out to have a glass fuse in it, which was shattered.

A glass fuse in an engine bay, not sure who thought that'd be a good idea but it's lasted this long right? I plan to remove it and replace with a circuit breaker in the morning. Will post up results in case someone else has the same issue.

 

[pn]

Re: ~1986 VRO 40, master fuse?

hmm, i've never seen that before. take a look at your grounds and the kill switch circuit if you still have problems, and the neutral switch too.

 

[boobie]

Re: ~1986 VRO 40, master fuse?

When a glass fuse blows it's either from old age ( they wear out too ) or you have a short in the system.

 

[Noltz]

Re: ~1986 VRO 40, master fuse?

The way then engine was completely unresponsive from the controller, yet I could manually jump from the starter solenoid and the engine would turn quickly tells me the power and ground supply to the engine is was good, and that it was a control issue, not a supply issue. The glass fuse looks like it may be original. The glass broke, leaving the caps buried in the connector. It'd be all but impossible to check & service this fuse on the water, as it's at the very back of the engine. That's why I want to swap it to a circuit breaker, or even update this and the fuse block to the more reliable (and easily found) blade-type fuses.

PN, you were right to say check grounds. Although not my problem, I did find a wire that had separated from it's eyelet connector right beside this "master fuse" holder, as seen here.

It's somewhat amusing but you can actually see the broken wire in the original picture... which is originally from last year. Whoops!! Stores are still closed but I'll post a when it's been solved.

 

[Noltz]

Re: ~1986 VRO 40, master fuse?

SOLVED!

So yes, this is the master fuse, and yes it was my problem. It is a 20A SFE type fuse, not an AGC. Short version is SFE type fuses are different lengths based on their amperage rating. AGC is all the same length, and too long for the OEM holder. But it does start and run again with that fuse in place. The local auto shop did not have a stud-type circuit breaker, so that's this afternoon's project.