1986 Johnson 70 no spark

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Xterminator GT

Xterminator GT

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I was working on my motor yesterday and my 4 year old son was helping me and he arced a wrench between the hot post and small ground post on the starter solenoid. Now the motor has no spark. Any help or direction would be much appreciated.
 
Check the fuse on the wiring harness first. Small, red rubber fuse holder usually not too far from the big red connector. Hopefully that blew before any other electronics did. if it was just arcing the solenoid, I think you have a good chance of it being the fuse.

Also make sure the little guy didn't decide to make a lasso out of your kill switch key.


Good luck!
 
Respectfully...you can take the boat wiring harness and throw it away and the engine should still have spark. A blown fuse will not eliminate spark. The only fuse on the engine is for the start and trim functions.
Spark is eliminated by connecting the Black/yellow lead to ground. That grounds the ignition system and stops the engine. Your engine's ignition system is a magneto style. Once the flywheel is turning it generates its own voltage/current needed to produce spark. Check the black/yellow with an ohmeter to verify.
 
Thinking a bit further about this. Go ahead and disconnect the control box (boat) side of the wiring harness from the engine. Should be a big red plug.
Pull your spark plugs out.
Have someone stick a phillips head screwdriver into a spark plug lead and hold the shank of it close to a clean engine ground. NOT NEAR A SPARK PLUG HOLE!!!
Wrap a rope around your flywheel and pull smartly. See if the ignition system is working now.
If it is there is a chance that the high current battery lead your son grounded to a tiny ground was looking for additional places to make a good ground. The black yellow on the back of the key switch could have taken a hit as a result. Ignition components may have been damaged. This will tell you which side of the harness to focus on at any rate.
 
I followed your instructions Pappy and I still have no spark. So one of the ignition components took the hit.
 
One more check.
On your powerhead the wiring harness will make connections to the power pack. Find the connection that has the black/yellow lead in it at the power pack. Find a small tool and gently push the black/yellow terminal out of one side of the connector. Try the test again. This will eliminate the engine harness side from the ignition. Let us know. If this does not work then you have two choices.....
Take it to a dealer and have them put a peak reading meter on it for output from the pack and output from the stator or....guess.
A guess would be that the power pack took a hit between the black yellow and black (ground). Guess only. Your call at this point. If you own a multi meter it gets a bit easier.
A multimeter would tell you if the black yellow coming out of the pack is shorted to ground. You can also check the boat harness. With the key on the black yellow should show no connection to the black terminal. With the key off it should show connection to the black terminal. Oh....one more little tidbit. The black/yellow lead has up to 300V on it while the flywheel is turning so be a bit careful with it!
 
I disconnected to black/yellow wire coming from the power pack. Still no spark.

If I’m understanding you right, your saying to check continuity between the black and black/yellow with the key off and on.

I’ve been doing some reading on CDI Electronics website, since that’s where my power pack and stator is from, and I’m going to buy a DVA adapter for my voltmeter to further diagnose this.
 
The key switch test is or can be for the key switch only if you just want to test across the terminals for the black/black yellow or for the key switch and harness if you want to test at the red 10 pin connector with the key on and off. You can also check the powerhead harness this way as well with an ohmeter.
 

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