1971 Mercury 7.5 Ignition Issues

Minnboater

Cadet
Joined
Jul 9, 2011
Messages
10
A while ago I purchased an ancient Mercury 7.5 HP that had sat for years and years without running. The outboard looked really nice under the hood, and the price was right and so I didn't mind spending a little money on parts This is one odd little engine under the flywheel; it has a stator and mechanical points. One of the cylinders had no spark so I bought a lime green coil off of ebay after the seller indicated it was a replacement part for my vintage outboard (1971). The engine started immediately after but it ran rough. The spark on the other cylinder was weak by comparison so I went looking for another lime green coil. No luck, so I picked up familiar looking orange coil from a boneyard near my house. Once this coil was on, the little outboard ran perfectly. One trip on the water was all I got however, and it hasn't started since. There's no spark on either cylinder now and I'm wondering if I messed things up with the coils. My question: did running the motor with mismatched coils fry the stator? I think there's supposed to be 400 VAC at the green wire going to the coils but there's nothing there now when I pull the starter. The insulators under the flywheel look great. I read online somewhere that you shouldn't hit the kill switch on this motor unless you are in the lake. I think I hit that switch a few times before hearing that when it was running in my driveway cooled by a garden hose and earmuffs. Any help or perspective you folks can offer would be appreciated.

​Many thanks.
 

Minnboater

Cadet
Joined
Jul 9, 2011
Messages
10
Ancient seemed like a good description for this motor because it sat outside in Minnesota for 40 years. Minnesota has a brutal cycle of frigid cold and snow in the winter and heat and rain and humidity in the summer. 40 years of that will make anything look ancient. And secondarily, Kiekhaefer's unholy alliance of mechanical and solid state parts looks like something an ancient astronaut might have brought to earth around the time of Stonehenge.

I don't understand LOL. Why use it? Why not write "laugh" or L? Is the out loud part really needed? Isn't a laugh by definition something you utter out loud?
From the good folks at dictionary.com:

Laugh: to express mirth, pleasure, derision, or nervousness with an audible, vocal expulsion of air from the lungs that can range from a loud burst of sound to a series of quiet chuckles and is usually accompanied by characteristic facial and bodily movements.
 
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