Verdantsea
Recruit
- Joined
- Jul 26, 2018
- Messages
- 1
Mercruiser 3.0 Alpha One SN 2770087 A preface on skill level. I am just learning to work on my own boat. I have basic car repair skills because my dad was a motorhead and he said being a girl was no excuse not to know how to fix a car.
The history
Replaced a bad distributor with a used good one out of a running boat.
Got everything back together and could not get a spark off of the coil. Kind neighbor took me through how to test the coil. Tested fine.
Some research later I decide replacing the points and condenser like I intended anyway was a good place to start. But she still cranks but won’t start.
I go back through all my connections. Re check my gap and all the wiring. Notice that the wires connected at the points are a bit loose and slightly corroded. Sand and tighten up that connection and she fires up and runs. Not idling perfectly but figure that’s just timing but it’s getting late and mosquitoes are here. So will time it tomorrow.
When I get back to it I notice there is a crack in the distributor cap that came with the used distributor. At the time thinking it’s just old and brittle and I had picked one up just in case so I swap them out. Making sure to label and place the wires correctly. After that it was hard to start but got it started once and it ran rough for about 5 minutes but only at a high idle which wasn’t unusual, it’s always taken a while to warm up. But it’s really rough. Then it suddenly belched smoke a few times and died. After that it won’t start but will crank. Just more belching. Only change between running and not at this point is a new distributor cap and 12 hours time. Was I given an incorrect cap. Could there be another intermittent issue? This new cap has no positive seat and could be installed 180 degrees off but I would not think it would start if that were the case but maybe I’m wrong.
The history
Replaced a bad distributor with a used good one out of a running boat.
Got everything back together and could not get a spark off of the coil. Kind neighbor took me through how to test the coil. Tested fine.
Some research later I decide replacing the points and condenser like I intended anyway was a good place to start. But she still cranks but won’t start.
I go back through all my connections. Re check my gap and all the wiring. Notice that the wires connected at the points are a bit loose and slightly corroded. Sand and tighten up that connection and she fires up and runs. Not idling perfectly but figure that’s just timing but it’s getting late and mosquitoes are here. So will time it tomorrow.
When I get back to it I notice there is a crack in the distributor cap that came with the used distributor. At the time thinking it’s just old and brittle and I had picked one up just in case so I swap them out. Making sure to label and place the wires correctly. After that it was hard to start but got it started once and it ran rough for about 5 minutes but only at a high idle which wasn’t unusual, it’s always taken a while to warm up. But it’s really rough. Then it suddenly belched smoke a few times and died. After that it won’t start but will crank. Just more belching. Only change between running and not at this point is a new distributor cap and 12 hours time. Was I given an incorrect cap. Could there be another intermittent issue? This new cap has no positive seat and could be installed 180 degrees off but I would not think it would start if that were the case but maybe I’m wrong.
