2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

[vett84.5]

I just got back from a fishing trip with my new to me boat motor. It is a Mercury 2006 60hp four stroke. I had lots of trouble with running the battery down. My battery is an optimax that is only a year old, I purchased another agm battery from bass pro during the trip and had the same problems with running the battery down. I also was running my fishfinder the whole time on the trip, a lowarance hds -7 with the structure scan. We were trolling 90% of the time, so with the motor running the whole time I would think the battery would have stayed charged. The engine ran fine, the fish finder worked great, my trouble was only with running my battery down. What direction do I need to head in? Thank you

 

[carholme]

Re: 2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

What is your engine s/n?

Gerry

 

[vett84.5]

Re: 2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

I do not have my boat with me. I left it where I was fishing, lucky me I get to go back there this wednesday with the wife. The motor is a long shaft, it is not a bigfoot, it is electric fuel injection. I was wondering if it would charge the battery at idle and at slow trolling speeds, would the fuel injection and the fish finder drain down the battery? Does the battery not get charged under certain rpms?

 

[sschefer]

Re: 2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

I do not have my boat with me. I left it where I was fishing, lucky me I get to go back there this wednesday with the wife. The motor is a long shaft, it is not a bigfoot, it is electric fuel injection. I was wondering if it would charge the battery at idle and at slow trolling speeds, would the fuel injection and the fish finder drain down the battery? Does the battery not get charged under certain rpms?

I have the 2011 4 Stroke 60 EFI and run a HDS-8 with the sonichub, weather module and structure scan plus the Lowrance VHF radio. I troll at idle for 5 or 6 hours at a time and it does run the battery down. I'm probably drawing 15 amps and at idle only making 10 on the 50 amp motor stator.

I ran a single Optima D34 last year but this year went to dual Optima D31's in parrallel as house batteries and then a standard start/deep cycle for my starting battery. I have it on a BlueSea single switch with a ACR (Add a battery system). So far this is working very nicely but I do have to put the house batteries on the charger at night if I run my 55# 12v Minn-Kota PowerDrive V2 iPilot. I have a total of 240 reserve minutes @ 25amps and use the Minn-Kota to cover trolling speeds below 2.4 mph. I'm never really pulling a lot of current and rarely get over 5 on the motor power level so with the trolling motor running and dragging the main off and in neutral, I get about 4 hours of run time before I hit the 40% charge mark. However, my starting battery is still at 100% and ready to go when I need it to be.

 

[vett84.5]

Re: 2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

Ok, thank you very much. So I now have 2 batteries. What do you think the run time on one battery would be with just the lowrance running on it? I was running the fishfinde and the structure and downscan at the same time. I could make it basically a day(6-7 hours) last week running the motor and the fish finder on the one battery. I would charge the other while I was running one. It was a real pain switching batteries out. I have a custom boat, 1960 starcraft. Been a project for the last few years and just took it out for the first time last week with the new motor. I am going back down with the wife and would like to eliminate some of the hassel, what would you suggest I do?

 

[carholme]

Re: 2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

Here is the manual for a 60/4 stroke/EFI:

http://1manual.com/Mercury manuals/Service Manual PDFs/FourStroke/883065/cover.pdf

You must have Adobe Acrobat reader installed to use this manual. If you scroll down to the lower part of the opening page, you will see the various engine components in red. Click on the one you want and when the first page opens, click on the "Save As" icon at the top LH corner of the page and you can save it to your computer.

If you are able to use a voltmeter and read ohms, there is a simple regulator/rectifier diode test on page 2B-16 (Charging and Starting System).

Gerry

 

[vett84.5]

Re: 2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

Thank you very much Gerry, I will be able to check everything this weekend.
Anthony

 

[Timestep]

Re: 2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

Mercury acknowledge there is a problem and offer a new regulator and other parts at a concessionary price. I know, I was that man!

Dave

 

[vett84.5]

Re: 2006 60 hp Mercury Four Stroke not charging the battery

Just got back from my second outing. I didn't see the last post till yesterday. Was the recall fro 2006? I have seen where the recall was for 2003-2004. I seperated my batterys and fish finder for the last trip. I ran my engine only on one battery and I ran my fish finder and bilge pup on my other battery. After a little over a day my engine battery ran down again. So it is definately not the fish finder running the battery down. I had to switch to that battery to get the engine to start. I have not tested anything with an ohm meter. To be honest I have no real experience using one. My next weeeknd off( I work every other) I will get one rounded up to see what I can check. But would definately assume at this point that the motor is not charging the battery.