Mercury KE-7 potential issues

[green-thumbs]

What do you know of your KE 7’s history? Did you acquire it as a running motor?
Many old outboards were put away for a reason and many have been worked on by the less skilled,
Assume Nothing and Double Check Everything including you own work. An old time gas station mechanic told me “If it has ignition, carburetion and compression it has to run”
A motor that starts, runs and
quits suggests it is getting enough fuel ai mixture to start but not enough to keep
running. Try another carburetor, fuel filter and
clean out fuel line. Tank
may not be as clean as you thing it is. Easy was to check
carburetor is to swap in a known to be good carb of same
make and model. Same with spark plugs.
Your first Merc will either sour you on the breed or tempt
you into another,
Good Luck

[Waunnaboat]

I was on a trip and was not able to look into it, but now that I am back I am guessing that the issue lies in the coils and/or condensers because the spark was very weak with brand new J8C spark plugs (I know that may not be right, but I just needed to check for spark in a hurry).  Being that it can best be described as a “Frankenstein motor”, and I did not pay much for it, I think I will let it go and get a better example of a KG-7 that will give me less trouble. I find the KE-7 lineage of motors to be very interesting, so I doubt that I will give up on the whole Mercury brand for a while.

"Outboards seem to multiply exponentially..........I find that for every finished project, there are two more waiting to be completed."

[green-thumbs]

A Parts Manual and a junk motor to take apart may be low cost high return investment
if you turn Green,
Louis

t

[Waunnaboat]

green-thumbs wrote:

A Parts Manual and a junk motor to take apart may be low cost high return investment
if you turn Green,
Louis

t

I’ll definitely think about that.  I was actually able to get it to run well with the prop off in the test tank by starting it at full throtle.  I don’t know what is occurring inside there that causes a need for weird starting, but it is running well and pumping water, so it is A OK in my book for the time being.  Time will tell weather or not it runs well tomorrow on a lake.

"Outboards seem to multiply exponentially..........I find that for every finished project, there are two more waiting to be completed."

[Author]

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