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1989 Mercury 70HP intermittent spark

Haustow

New member
Red Stator

Engine sat for a couple years, but never had this problem prior.

I ran the motor 8-10 times on the hose to make sure it ran right, cleaned carbs, adjusted, checked compression, timing, etc. Never had a no start spark issue during the last month, but I did test the Ohms/DVA outputs and all seemed in range during that time.

Took boat for water test and ran pretty good. Shut down to fish for an hour and motor would not start back up. NO SPARK on any cylinder. Cranked and cranked and nothing. Yes battery is always fully charged and turns over motor quickly.

Let boat sit for 2 weeks and went to diagnose the issue. Removed the black kill switch wire on the power pack. Cranked over a few times and had no spark for maybe 15 seconds, and then all of a sudden got spark on all cylinders. Put kill switch wire back on and still had spark so not that easy.

Ran engine on hose for a while and ran great. Went straight to the water and would not start. NO SPARK. Cranked on it multiple times over a couple hour period and nothing. Brought it home and ran some tests.

Stator:
Stator Ohms (green/white to white/green) - 600 ohms
Stator DVA - 235V

Trigger: (performed these tests with all wires hooked up to pack)
Trigger Ohms (Black to brown, white, and purple) - All had 1,249ohms across the board
Trigger DVA - All had about 5.8V

Coils:
Here is where I got some odd readings. Again, coils were tested on motor with all wires hooked up.
Coil primary: Originally had a reading fluctuating between 0.1 to over 1.0, but then all I got was 0.0ohms consistently.
Coil output: All coils were the same 1,490ohms across all 3 cylinders. (supposed to be 800-1,100).

Power pack?
 
Could be. If you can locate a DVA meter you would find out immediately what is wrong. (Ohm readings can trick you.)

I bought an adapter for my ohm meter on Amazon for about 30 bucks. Great tool!

Jeff
 
Could be. If you can locate a DVA meter you would find out immediately what is wrong. (Ohm readings can trick you.)

I bought an adapter for my ohm meter on Amazon for about 30 bucks. Great tool!

Jeff

I have the adapter that’s how I got the DVA Voltage readings above. What else can I check with it?
 
If these are original spark components I might suggest complete replacement. My 89 Merc was acting up and rather than skimp....I replaced all.....so happy I did.
 
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