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75 horse mariner running rough and cutting off

starkyb

New member
While driving out on the lake yesterday my motor just started running rough and cutting off when I put it in idle. I also noticed gas leaking out from under the motor cover. It was also very hard to start afterwards. I also noticed that the primer bulb would not get hard when I would try to restart it. The strangest thing is that when I would get it started it would ilde smoothly and run perfectly. I would cut the motor just to see if it would restart and it would on the first try. Sometimes I can run it and not have a problem all day and sometimes it acts like that at the launch ramp. Any ideas what it might be. The fuel line and bulb are brand new and will get rock hard almost all of the time. Please Help!!​


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The intermittent soft primer bulb tends to indicate you have a leak somewhere.

Since the fuel line and bulb are new combined with the "gas leaking out from under the cover" point to something "under the hood".

The number one suspects would be the fuel lines from the connector (on the motor itself) back to the fuel pump, or between it and the carbs (or intake if you have an EFI model). Other possible culprits are the fuel filter (under the hood, if equipped) or even the fuel pump itself.

If this is a carb model, additionally a sticky float valve in one of the carbs could cause flooding resulting in crappy idle, stalling and fuel leaking out of the throat.

Take the hood off and look for obvious signs of a leak. If you can't find it, pump up the primer bulb and see if you can force a leak. If no amount of detective work seems to find the source, I would bet on the float valve - if it's intermittent it can be difficult to spot...
 
Thanks for the replies!! When I pumped the primer it got hard and there was no leaking anywhere. If it is a sticky float what should be my next course of action?
 
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