JamesE wrote:
Okay I was planning on buying a new electronic distributor, but those
have really gone up in price. Since I don't want to spend that much
money so I will repair this one. But the problem is that today I
looked at the mechanical advance in the distributor and everything was
intact and appeared to be moving fine. Therefore I don't think that
this is the problem like I originally did. The points did have slight
pitting but nothing severe. Tomorrow I am going to order the
electronic conversion kit because I want to get rid of the points.
However I don't think that the distributor is the problem, so this
won't fix it. Does anyone have any other suggestions on what could be
wrong? I want to fix this myself because I am pretty mechanically
inclined and don't want to pay a mechanic. I was thinking maybe the
coil is bad because there is slight pitting in the distributor cap.
Also I don't think it is the timing chain causing the problem because
this boat was not used very often. The previous owner had the boat
for five years and never once used it. So this problem may have been
caused because the boat sat for five years, although it was properly
winterized. This may be a carburetor problem, although I am leaning
towards an ignition problem. I have already sprayed the carburetor
with carburetor cleaner but if I can't fix this problem my next step
will be to try rebuilding the carburetor.


It sounds like you have to pin down the timing issue first. I doubt it
would be the mechanical advance unless a spring has broken.

I've used the Pertronix Ignitor from

http://www.vintageperformance.com/re...s/mercruis.htm

in Mercruisers without any problems at all. Huge improvement - holds
the dwell steady so the base timing can be set accurately. The 3.0 is a
durable engine, I've not heard much about timing chain failures on them.

Rob