Run into this? My boat is named *after* that very problem! And there ar
emany on this very board that watched me tear my hair out.

My 1962 Merc 1000 (advertised in '62 as the Black Phantom) had this problem,
which would cause the voltage to rise and then the condensors (at the
breaker points) to fail at about 17 volts. This of course, after about 10
minutes at WOT after the start-up. It took me a while to figure out *why*
the motor would always turn to crap after about 10 minutes runtime.
Overvoltage was the *last* thing that came to mind, I was looking for a
thermal intermittant in the ignition.

The problem itself, that motor, and (by default) that boat, *earned* the
name of "The Phantom Menace", as it would always quit once you were far
from shore.

I don't totally get the mechanics of the problem, just that the newer
batteries don't seem to be able to bleed off the excess output like the old
ones did. On my new boat (the PMII) I installed a later model rectifier /
regulator combo on my big Inline.

-W

(now you know why Mercury paint is called "Phantom Black" by the way)





"CCred68046" wrote in message
...
Clamp it with a Zener Diode somewhere on the 12v output line. All excess
current will bleed off.

Thanks Clams,

I know I could regulate it easily. You are an old Merc fan and you know
how to
fix it so you must have run into this before. What I am looking for is
the
reason its doing this now after it ran fine all those years. Everything
is
still in spec electrically. I really find this interesting. All the posts
on
the web about it and no one can or has answered it yet.