86 omc 4.3l stalls at mid throttle.

[tcsojohnson]

I recently purchased an 86 regal medallion with a 4.3l omc cobra stern drive. i took out to the lake and after about an hour, the motor started stalling at cruising speed. it ran fine at low speed/rpm however anything above mid throttle and it stalled. It has a new fuel filter, fuel tanks been drained and replaced with new fuel. my best guess would be the ignition coil or distributor but I dont want to spend $100 on parts if i dont have to. Any thoughts on what could cause the stalling?

 

[wizard]

After it stalls will it start right back up or do you have to wait a bit?

 

[o2batsea]

Dirty Carb. You have to expect glitches when you buy a used boat. The best approach when buying used is to replace all the consumables (hoses, belts, batteries, fluids, tune up) rebuild or replace the carb. When you do this it will give you a base line of maintenance so that you know exactly what was done when and you can keep up a regular schedule. This will minimize disappointments and frustrations...especially for guests.
I bet that boat still has the original belts and hoses.

 

[the_tassie_devil]

Check to see that the Carby isn't flooding.

Mine did that and I found that the Float had a split in it.

Bruce.

 

[tcsojohnson]

checked the carb and float, both are good to go. the belts are new, however,the hoses appear to be original. I took it back out to the lake today with even worse results. In nuetral, the engine runs fine, and i can rev it to 5-6000 rpm with out a glitch. once I put it in gear, it has an extremely rough idle and if i give it any throttle, it stalls out. I can restart the engine with no hesitation. any thoughts?

 

[the_tassie_devil]

Sounds like the electrical side of the ignition is breaking down as soon as any load is applied.

I would be looking at the Coil, and Leads, and Condenser for a start.

You can check these parts, especially the coil and leads by simply replacing them with units that are known to be good, then replacing with correct parts, what you find is causing the problem.

Ignition components can work when no load is applied, but when the "Pressure" of load is applied, it doesn't take much for faulty parts to collapse.

Bruce.

 

[boatin_bob]

Disconnect the ESA and then try it again, could be activating when you go into gear.

 

[tcsojohnson]

one more issue to throw into the mix... When shifting, it smoothly shifts into forward gear, however, when trying to put it into reverse, it feels like its slipping but once it is in reverse, no more rough idle or stalling... from reading the other threads, and bob's reply its sounding more like the ESA but I dont really know what to look for.

 

[wizard]

I sure sounds like Bob has the right thing to look at.

 

[boatin_bob]

use the pics for reference, find the shift bracket as in the first pic, the ESA module is mounted on the backside of it. The 2nd pic shows a module, this one is built by CDI/Rapair but they look the same. From the module you will see 2 cables plus a ground wire, you want the cable that has a 2 pin plug on it (not the 4 pin) and the wires should be purple and gray, just unplug it. This will make it very difficult to shift out of gear into neutral but it's just for testing purposes and then take her for a spin.

 

[hordos]

Yes it shure sounds like the ESA, but one other thing you can try is run a jumper wire from the battery to the coil. This will indicate if your wireing is at fault as it was with my boat.