Hi guys,

I bought a 1995 38 Special (Baja) about two weeks ago. When I went on the sea trial with the guy the boat ran great. I guess it has some sort of intermitten problem that is driving me crazy. The one engine will run great and just die at any given time and then not start agian. I first thought it was loss of fuel but when I checked the carb and it seems to be getting fuel just fine. I then started to check out the the ignition system but I'm kinda lost. To tell you the truth I'm a noob to boat engines and could use some advice. Oh, one more thing. The engine will start just fine after it sits for 10-15 minutes. It's so odd.

Chris

Sounds like a question in the tech section right now. Check out the coil.

sounds like a coil doesn't it. swap coils?

Yeah, I took the coil from the other engine and the problem didn't follow... I also replaced the pick up sensor on the distributor. That gave my engine about 2-300 more rpm (odd)than before but no fix on the stalling-

yes, sounds most likley the coil next time it happens feel the coil if hot thats your problem or you can try just swapping them as suggested.....you can do a resistance test but this is easier

Watch the tach very carefully when it fails. If the tach drops VERY quickly or wobbles before the engine dies you likely have a bad ignition module. They will overheat internally and stop sending signal to the coil. Takes about 10-15 minutes to cool down and away you go.

When I watched the tach the needle "bobbed" like the engine was running out of gas or something. It would try to go back up a couple times then after that the engine goes dead -

Swap the module or put in a new one, they're cheap.

Awesome - Is that the blue looking box near the dist? It is called Mercathode or something?

Whoops, I take that back, I just looked it up. That sucker is expensive, swap them first to see if it's the problem.


An newer module will look like this one

And an older one looks like this