[Moody Blue]

Working on converting a pull start to electric start. Have it pretty well worked out (so far) but I am puzzled by one thing. The remote electric start engines used a starter solenoid but the non-remote electric start engines did not. The battery was hooked directly to the start switch, neutral start switch and then the starter motor. What kind of current do these switches have to handle? Any takers?

[ezeke]

Heavy duty switch - probably 40 amps - think of a solenoid as an electrically operated switch vs your mechanical one. The only reason to have electrical operation is so that you can run smaller wire to the helm instead of heavy cable.

[rodbolt]

because of the voltage drop due to the increased cable length on the tiller electric the starter switch is at the motor, the negative cable goes from the battery to the engine and the positive goes batt,switch,nuetral start switch starter, the remote path is battery + to the control box and back to the nuetral start switch, would require at least a 6 ga cable for a 20ft cable run which would be a 10ft distance. so a solinoid,electro-mechanical switch, is added, the solinoid draws less than 3 amps normally and is capeable of passing 300 amps or so, that way we can control the starter with a 16ga wire on a 15-20 amp fuse from 40 ft cable runs. and the battery cables are still 6 ft long. remember that cable ft and total distance are not always the same.

[Moody Blue]

Makes perfect sense the way you guys explained it, thanks. I was worried I had missed something. I purchased just this afternoon a momentary pushbutton switch c/w rubber boot rated 32V @ 60A. That should do it I guess for the start switch, now I need to locate a neutral start switch assy. I'm halfway there.