I have a 1996 Four Winns Horizon 170 with a 3.0 GS engine. I purchased the boat last summer, it ran great all last year and about 6 times so far this summer. Cruising the other day at about 3000 rpms and the engine died. It restarted and took off again for about 3 minutes and died again. This time the engine would not roll. I checked voltage at the coil and only had 4 VDC. I seperated the harness connection and jumped 12VDC to the coil and jumped the starting relay and the engine started right up. After some time with the meter I found that the key switch had 12VDC and it was putting correct voltage to the coil and the start relay connections on the key switch. Strange part is the ignition fuse was blown, but it had a light in fuse and i believe that is why I was seeing the 12 vdc at the key switch, the load from the coil must have been dropping the actual voltage when it got to the coil.
My question is could the coil be breaking down when hot and causing the fuse to blow or could it be a bad gauge. I tested the wiring and nothing is going to ground. I removed the tether switch and am running directly from the fuse to the key switch. I think this was a problem before I bought the boat because the fuse is note OEM. They had a 25 amp installed with the light in it. All seems fine now but I dont think the real problem has been solved yet. Anyone seen anything like this before?
My question is could the coil be breaking down when hot and causing the fuse to blow or could it be a bad gauge. I tested the wiring and nothing is going to ground. I removed the tether switch and am running directly from the fuse to the key switch. I think this was a problem before I bought the boat because the fuse is note OEM. They had a 25 amp installed with the light in it. All seems fine now but I dont think the real problem has been solved yet. Anyone seen anything like this before?