Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

[chriscraft254]

I'm a new member, been lurking for a while. Here is my story to date. Hope it helps me and others. And hope I find the help I need here.

I bought a 1990 Chris Craft 254 Seahawk 2 years ago. The boat is solid in all respects except for how she runs. I have pretty much refurbed her and set her up the way I want for my uses. I have invested in this boat to make it last for years to come. I love the boat and how she rides, but I HAVE to get this motor stuff squared away, this boat will probably see more use than most around my area. I live on the water when ever I can.

When I purchased the boat it supposedly had a new rebuild in it with like 10 hours. The outdrive had also been rebuilt. I purchased the boat with the knowledge that the previous owner was having issues with the setup. It was a PCM motor. He said that the motor may still be under warranty. PCM did not warranty the motor for me. That in itself is a long story that I just soon forget about, no reason to go there. Simply put, I will NEVER purchase anything from PLeasure Craft Marine! And they are probably happy about that!

Brought the boat home, cleaned her up and headed out to sea trial after running motor in driveway with ears on. During sea trial, ran pretty good at first but then got a knocking sound. Shifter was not operating correctly either, out of adjustment. Backed her off and headed to port.

Ok, a little discouraged but still remembering that i did not pay much for the boat, I had an open mind. Took the boat to the highest recommended mechanic in my area. Only mechanic that I would trust to be honest in my area. He tore the engine down and found spun bearings.

We discussed rebuilding that motor, but I opted to go with a rebuild Vortec longblock to get more horsepower and a two year waranty. The motor was from a guy he has used hundreds of times in the past.

So the motor gets installed and after adjusting the shifter as best we could, I headed out to sea trail. I also had installed trim tabs to help performance.

The boat ran good and I thought my worries were over for a while atleast.
I went out the following weekend and the fun begins. Boat was on plane and all of a sudden sounded like it was choking to death, I backed it down and headed to port.

I will admit that my memory on the next two years is not the best, but basically the motor was set up with an electrical fuel pump, holly carb , mallory ignition. The mechanic would get it up and running but it kept burning things up. Plugs, distributors, coils etc. We kept trying different things. We went back to a points system, those burnt up in no time at all. The mech put a resistor inline with the fuel pump thinking it was drawing to much power from the system. Once he did that I got like two months of use until KNOCK< KNOCK<KNOCK.

Needless to say, I am very unhappy at this point. It was the end of the season, and we start talking options. The rebuild is sent back to the motor manufacturer for warranty. The manufacturer comes back and says, sorry, not going to warranty. He said the moter had two scorn cylinders walls caused by lack of fuel, detenation or overheat.

At this point, my mechanic and I discuss who's issue this is. I didn't even have time in between problems to screw things up. The mechanic new this wasn't my fault, but at he same time really didn't believe it was his. Being the guy that he is, he told me he would cover the cost to replace with another rebuild.

So that brings us to today, I am concerned that with the ESA sysem, we are just simply missing something. Non of this makes since. For example, The new motor is installed with a mallory ignition, manual fuel pump now, and edelbrock carb because mine had a rotted float bowl. The mechanic friday was working on getting the motor cranked up and tuned. I showed up and basically overlooked what he was doing. And yes, I asked if it botherd him, he said no.

The issue we are having right now is, he has had to advance the mallory ignition to 15/16 to get it to run smooth. This is twice the advance that it should be and can harm the motor. He has disconnected the ESA to try and get the motor correct before we start adjusting anything to do wih the ESA.

I think the issues we are having is because we are missing something. What ignition should be on this boat? Can I run a electronic distributor or do I need to have a points system? He is talking about putting a delco distributor in it to see if that helps. He thinks its a better distributor.
He has also discussed running just two wires for the ESA like a mercruiser. My gut tells me that is not a good idea.

Any experts or experienced people, please chime in, because I NEED your help!!!!!i Thankyou for your help in advance, any insight will be greatly appreciated.

 

[chriscraft254]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

No one?:facepalm: I'm a carpenter, not mechanic! Here is the boat, I have done alot to her since the purchase, but as you can see, it is ready to go if I can get it to run good.

 

[HT32BSX115]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

I think the issues we are having is because we are missing something. What ignition should be on this boat? Can I run a electronic distributor or do I need to have a points system? He is talking about putting a delco distributor in it to see if that helps. He thinks its a better distributor.

Howdy,

Well.....first of all...nice looking boat! Sorry you're having all these problems...


I would like to know a little more though...

Were the carb, and ignition system Marine units, and why was an electric fuel pump installed?

Your description sounded like detonation. possibly from overheating, advanced (too far) mechanical advance advancing too far etc... I am not surprised the rebuilder didn't want to cover it...... detonation leaves fairly obvious telltale signs....


It would be nice to know the original model/serial number of the engine . Although it appears that there's not much OMC left under the hood.

You're sort of stuck with using the ESA if that's a DOG-clutch Cobra though. Ignition-interrupt doesn't work well with the Cobras.............it's sort of why OMC spent a lot of time and money developing the ESA......

I am not sure what kind of distributor your mechanic is considering installing. Which Delco are we talking about?

Both Mallory and MSD make a pretty good marine distributor and there's nothing wrong with points type ignition. It's simple and reliable.

If the ignition timing is WAY off, I would look to the cam timing...... maybe someone didn't get the timing chain on right?

Does your current dist have a vacuum advance connection on it? (is it a Marine dist?) Is your carb a marine carb and was it rebuilt?


Do you or your Mechanic have an OEM OMC service manual?

It sounds like there's more than one thing going on......but it's not rocket science.....

regards,


Rick

 

[chriscraft254]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

Thankyou and thanks for the response. I will try and answer all your questions in order here.

When I purchased the boat, the boat had a marine holly carb, Not sure about the igniton being marine. The electric fuel pump was also already installed. Not sure why it was installed. I think going back to a manual fuel pump should be fine and probably more reliable.

I agree with you on the rebuilder, after all the issues we had with the boat, I really am not surprised that the motor scored two cylinders. I just don't want it to happen again.:facepalm:

I doubt that I will be able to find any info on the original engine because it was already replaced with the bad PCM rebuilt motor when I bought her. The best I can do is, whats in there now is a Vortec 350 which does have the port buss drilled to except the manual fuel pump.

I agree with you completely on the ESA system. From what I have read on the Hastings write-up and from the Omc manuel, the ESA system should work very smoothly once the time is taken to set it up correctly. I really don't see a problem with the ESA. I think the problem lies with what distributor is compatable with the ESA system.

I'm not sure of what delco distributor my mechanic is talking about. He showed it to me, but I will have to check with him monday. I'd like to know why the mallory he already has in there won't do the job. The disributors seem to be a problem before, my mechanic put the points system back in thinking that would help, but we burned up the points in very little time. Like 2 hours, then I was limping back to port. He did not have the resistor hooked up to the electrical pump then though.

Rick, I will have to double check on the distributor , I do not think it has an vacuum advance on it. I am pretty sure that everything he is using is Marine. The Carberator that he installed is a Marine carburator, it is brand new. It is an edelbrock carberator instead of the Holly. We replaced it because we found one of the float bowls in the holly was rotted out.

We do have an OMC service manual. I have also printed out the hastings write-up to give to him monday. I know this should be realitively easy imo to set-up. Thats why I don't get whats going on. I mean, we are going on two years of trouble here. Very frustrating. I will ask him about the timing chain monday also.

I had an old jeep that I use to run a one wire distributor in, (DUI). The carb was one wire Hp, and the alternator was one wire Hp. They were all performance parts. It was a very simple system, kinda like a tractor setup. I had gotten rid of all the emmisions control crap that robbed the motor of power, including two computers. This system on my boat doesn't seem to be much harder of a set up other than having to deal with the ESA. Am I wrong here?

Thanks again, Budd

Howdy,

Well.....first of all...nice looking boat! Sorry you're having all these problems...


I would like to know a little more though...

Were the carb, and ignition system Marine units, and why was an electric fuel pump installed?

Your description sounded like detonation. possibly from overheating, advanced (too far) mechanical advance advancing too far etc... I am not surprised the rebuilder didn't want to cover it...... detonation leaves fairly obvious telltale signs....


It would be nice to know the original model/serial number of the engine . Although it appears that there's not much OMC left under the hood.

You're sort of stuck with using the ESA if that's a DOG-clutch Cobra though. Ignition-interrupt doesn't work well with the Cobras.............it's sort of why OMC spent a lot of time and money developing the ESA......

I am not sure what kind of distributor your mechanic is considering installing. Which Delco are we talking about?

Both Mallory and MSD make a pretty good marine distributor and there's nothing wrong with points type ignition. It's simple and reliable.

If the ignition timing is WAY off, I would look to the cam timing...... maybe someone didn't get the timing chain on right?

Does your current dist have a vacuum advance connection on it? (is it a Marine dist?) Is your carb a marine carb and was it rebuilt?


Do you or your Mechanic have an OEM OMC service manual?

It sounds like there's more than one thing going on......but it's not rocket science.....

regards,


Rick

Picture of old carb float bowl. Rott!

Picture of motor before we replaced the carb with edelbrock.

Picture of new carb.

 

[donberry]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

just a wild guess here but it sounds as if you have an electrical wire grounding out, which would be why it keeps burning things up.
The electrical system is pretty straight forward as you don't have all of the electrical stuff found on newer cars. A little time consuming, but I would get out my trusty multimeter and start checking each wire in the ignition system for a short to ground. Just because, I would probably start with the wires on my coil first.

 

[chriscraft254]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

Don, I have checked most of the wiring myself and cleaned it up lot in the last couple months. I have not checked the wiring on the motor end. I was confident that the mechanic was. I will mention the ground to him, almost every electrical problem I have ever had, had something to do with bad ground or loose wire. How would that burn something up? I figured it just wouldn't run with a ground problem. Thanks

just a wild guess here but it sounds as if you have an electrical wire grounding out, which would be why it keeps burning things up.
The electrical system is pretty straight forward as you don't have all of the electrical stuff found on newer cars. A little time consuming, but I would get out my trusty multimeter and start checking each wire in the ignition system for a short to ground. Just because, I would probably start with the wires on my coil first.

 

[chriscraft254]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

Any other suggestions?

 

[HT32BSX115]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

It sounds like you're on the road to getting it running right. I asked about the carb and dist because a LOT of people think you can slap any carb and an HEI dist on it and make it happen. While sometimes that stuff works, you run a risk using non-marine stuff under the hood.

There's nothing wrong with Edelbrock carbs.

The dist might be a problem if the advance curve is not right or it's not advancing at all..... but I'm sure you're all over that. (if it DOES have a vacuum advance though, it's NOT a marine dist)

If you want to use the Mallory dist and it's an electronic trigger type, you might get with them on making it work with the OMC ESA (I know that Pertronix has a fix to make their electronic system work with an ESA)

Otherwise I would probably go back to a points type dist. You may have been burning "things" up because you didn't use an ignition resistor (or resistor wire) with a 6v coil.....or maybe there was a wiring error that allowed 12v to the coil all the time........ (Did the coil get really hot?) Points ignition is probably the simplest thing under the hood!

 

[chriscraft254]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

Were trying, I think it is just not going to work with the distributor we hve in there now. I am going to leave it to my mechanic to figure this out. If I point him in a certain direction and its wrong, then I might be at fault if something happens to that motor. I posted another thread of all I have been doing to get this boat setup the way I want her, been working on her non stop it seems. But she is ready to go as soon as he gets it right on the motor end.

I checked on the distributor and it does not have a vaccum advance so he is using all marine stuff. I also asked him about a resistor inline with the coil and he seemed to think he had one installed when we had the points in before. Is there any reason to have a resistor with an electronic coil?

I have heard the petronics distributors are no longer available but I have seen where they are still selling the upgrade kit for the distributors. The mallory in theory shouldn't need an adapter because t is already an electronic distributor.

I definately know he will get it worked out. The ESA system really should have no effect on how this thing runs until it is actuated while shifting in or out of gears. I am really praying I am finally able to get out on he water by this weekend.:facepalm: Thanks for your help. It is nice to have someone to talk to about this and get more ideas. Noone on tht had a clue really.

It sounds like you're on the road to getting it running right. I asked about the carb and dist because a LOT of people think you can slap any carb and an HEI dist on it and make it happen. While sometimes that stuff works, you run a risk using non-marine stuff under the hood.

There's nothing wrong with Edelbrock carbs.

The dist might be a problem if the advance curve is not right or it's not advancing at all..... but I'm sure you're all over that. (if it DOES have a vacuum advance though, it's NOT a marine dist)

If you want to use the Mallory dist and it's an electronic trigger type, you might get with them on making it work with the OMC ESA (I know that Pertronix has a fix to make their electronic system work with an ESA)

Otherwise I would probably go back to a points type dist. You may have been burning "things" up because you didn't use an ignition resistor (or resistor wire) with a 6v coil.....or maybe there was a wiring error that allowed 12v to the coil all the time........ (Did the coil get really hot?) Points ignition is probably the simplest thing under the hood!

 

[drem312]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

Hey budd any new. News?? I'm doing the wiring on my petronix nowi

 

[chriscraft254]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

Hey Drem, well, today, the mechanic pulled a used distributor out of a similar boat with the older style distributor, petronics I think. The distributor looked in really good condition. He installed it and went to crank it over and the starter is bad now,lol Murphy has taken over, I am really tired of this crap. Anyway, guess we will be installing a new starter, I will keep you posted. Read the hasting articles if you haven't already, Very good info there for the ESA systems. Does yours have the original distributor and omc drive?

Hey budd any new. News?? I'm doing the wiring on my petronix nowi

 

[drem312]

Re: Problems with 5.7 liter cobra/outdrive Long story! HELP!!!!!!!

Old distributor new ignitor petronix and new flame thrower matching coil