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no spark

mtmrayz

Member
Well, one problem to another.

Right now, I am getting no spark from my coil. I pulled the center wire from my distributor, held it close to the engine block and turned the engine over. Nothing.

I keep going over the wiring. The diagram from my manual shows a red wire and a black wire from the coil to the distributor and one additional wire from the ignition switch to the coil (grey?). I believe that is the wire that carries the power to the system. Is that correct? When I have the key turned to the run position, there is no power to that wire. I have used my multimeter and it registers nothing. Should it have power with the key on, or not until the distributor is spinning when I crank the engine?


*******Man, do I feel like an idiot! After reading some other posts, I went back out to try and figure out why there is no power to the coil. ITS BECAUSE i CUT THE PURPLE WIRE THAT HAD BEEN ATTACHED TO THE POSITIVE TERMINAL!

There is a purple wire that was just taped off and hanging by the distributor when I got the boat. There was also a purple wire attached to the coil. I assumed that the purple wire was one and the same, so I detached it from the coil and capped it off.

Well, I checked it with the key in the run position and it had power. Also, the wire running out of my ignition switch is purple.

So now I have this problem; Red wire from the positive coil terminal to the distributor, black wire from the negative coil terminal to the distributor, purple wire to the positive terminal of the coil. But, that leaves a grey wire and I can't remember whether it goes to the negative terminal or not. Anybody??/

I am pretty sure it does, but have lost all confidence.
 
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Grey is typically for the tach and goes on the same side of the coil as the red (distributor) wire. That would be the plus (+) side. All a tach really does is count pulses so it's counting the number times the coil discharges. FYI, we're used to saying positive and negative around DC electricity, but for the coil connections, it's plus (+) and minus (-).
 
Thanks, Joe. Does my info on the mysterious purple wire sound correct. When my key is in the run position, I should have a hot wire at my coil, correct?
 
Well, the grey went on the neg terminal. With the purple wire on the positive, the engine started and ran fine. Then, my tilt wouldn't work. Took the electiric motor off, hooked it directly to the battery and nothing. Gave it a wack with a big wrench and it started in fits. Gave it a couple more and it spun with gusto! switched the wires to make it go the other way and went through the same process. eventually is was going good in both directions. reinstalled and the tilt worked better than ever.

Not a technical fix, but hopefully it will get me through the season.
 
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