Logo

"Something" got really hot & a question about ground wires

djcamera

Contributing Member
Motor is a Mercury 75HP project that I'm bringing back to life after it sat for years.

The other day on the trailer (motor not running) I was trimming it down to work on something with the cowl off and a surprising amount of white smoke came out of the motor on the starboard side. In the general area of the circuit panel, maybe slightly below it. I stopped and let everything clear out, looked for anything melted. Trimmed all the way up....no smoke. Started trimming back down, after 2 seconds, more smoke again. Definitely from under the cowl, not from the trim motor. Couldn't pinpoint it.

The only thing I found amiss was a missing ground...that braided metal strap that connects the bottom of the exhaust cover to the cowl bracket. There's two of them, left and right of the spark plugs. The left one was gone. I replaced it with one from another motor, then tried the tilt/trim again. No smoke.

Could that have been the reason that SOMETHING was getting hot when I was trimming? I don't know if it's always smoked while trimming down, I just happened to notice that day because I had the cover off. Now I'm paranoid about my grounds and whether all of them are in place.
 
If something got so hot it burned away the insulation, you better make a thorough inspection of the entire wiring before venturing out into the big briny sea.
 
Back
Top