90 horse outboard electric issue(s) help!!

Evening gents,
i have a 1990, 90 horse Mariner that when given good gas and a carb rebuild ran amazing. it hasn't sat for more than a week without at least a 15 minute run and flush and has about 20 hrs in the last 3 months on the water. today i replaced the battery, drained the carb(run to dry everytime in the yard), new fuel, plugs are clean. then! i turned the ignition and it was turning over but never made it to fire. i tried in about 5-8 second stretches and on the 3rd time the starter didnt kick over but i heard i whining noise so some thing was trying to engage. i checked the tilt-trim and heard the same noise. stepped away from the boat for half hour and tried again and the starter engaged and motor almost fired. tried again, same whining noise with ignition and tilt. then tried again and that stopped too. now nothing, no whining, no click. 20 amp fuse is good, battery is good, every fuse under the console looks good, ignition worked in the beginning. any and all troubleshooting ideas much appreciated.

lets look into the not turning the motor over and the clicking noise...to start with you need a fully charged battery...it should read 12.7 volts....when you turn the key to start this voltage feeds thru the neutral switch and picks the starter solenoid...normally a yellow wire on the solenoid ...when the solenoid picks then the 12 volts feeds through the solenoid to turn your starter....the motor must turn 300 rpm minimum to fire...the clicking you are hearing is the solenoid picking and dropping...this is normally caused by a weak battery or bad connection or a bad wire on the positive or negative side of the battery feed to the motor..you are picking the solenoid ok but when the requirement of high current needed by the starter kicks in then you ''swamp'' the battery or circuit and then you dont have enough current available to even keep the solenoid picked...the same thing you hear when you got a bad battery or a loose or dirty post on a car or truck...to trouble shoot hook the negative lead to the negative post on the battery...hook the positive lead to the positive on the battery...the reading should be 12.7 or very close to it...try to start the motor and write down the reading across the battery...it will drop some but not much...then move the positive lead to the starter or the solenoid pick(yellow wire)and try to start again....the reading should be the same as you read across the battery...if it is not then you have a voltage drop in the positive cable or a bad connection on the battery..if it is the same then at this point move the meter lead on the negative post to a good ground on the motor...what you are checking here is for a good ground..
keep in mind that you will not read a voltage drop unless you are pulling current(trying to turn the motor)...just probing around wont tell you anything if you are just letting the motor set there..you will read the same voltage everywhere..

If the problem began when you replaced the battery its likely in the cable continuety @ the battery. Is it a new battery? If not, then the post may be the culprit. Even the wing nut type terminal posts can look good, yet loose continuety under load. Papy's tests will tell the story.

i dont like wing nuts..i notice a lot of marine batteries are now shipped with regular nuts....i throw wing nuts away and go with the regulars...and i have a cheap box end wrench in the battery compartment so i can check them when i am topping off a battery or back there for any reason....

Right on, brother. I use some grease on the post too! Always changing batterries in these small fishing boats. Leatherman on my belt at all times too.

awesome guys. thanks for the post and recommendations. what I found after countless troubleshooting was the most obvious thing ever. the negative battery cable was corroded below the wire clamp on the connection. confident that couldn't be the problem I replaced it anyway and the damn thing is running like new. if I learned anything from this its look for the simplest thing first and start there. wasted a lot of time and energy on that but we all learn somehow. thanks to each of you for your advice. PS, I did remove the wing nuts in favor of the traditional nut. thanks again

When I start with the simple things first its cheaper for my customers too. Way to go, brother.