My 1995 Force 120 outboard has what appears to be a really weak spark on cranking. The engine starts and runs, but not without a lot of fiddling. The real problem is getting my inductive timing light to fire so I can set the static timing. The pick-up on the light isn't getting a strong enough signal to fire the strobe. It's a high quality Sun timing light that's almost new, works great on everything else.
The above is just the background for my question, which concerns the grounding wiring on the motor. When I bought the boat, the ground wire to the stator CDI coil was fixed to one of the bolts on the rubber mounts holding the plate with the CDI boxes and regulator to the motor. The bolt was on one end of a rubber mount, so it was insulated somewhat from engine ground, and did show resistance to engine ground (can't recall how much). Anyway I ran a ground strap directly to the solenoid post ground (which is also connected directly to the battery), and connected all ground wires on the stator, regulator, etc. (about 5 wires total including the ground strap) to a single bolt on the main mounting plate just above the regulator.
I personally can't think of why this could possibly be the wrong approach to grounding, but who knows, I've definitely been wrong before. Is there any reason not to ground all of theses devices directly to the battery?
The above is just the background for my question, which concerns the grounding wiring on the motor. When I bought the boat, the ground wire to the stator CDI coil was fixed to one of the bolts on the rubber mounts holding the plate with the CDI boxes and regulator to the motor. The bolt was on one end of a rubber mount, so it was insulated somewhat from engine ground, and did show resistance to engine ground (can't recall how much). Anyway I ran a ground strap directly to the solenoid post ground (which is also connected directly to the battery), and connected all ground wires on the stator, regulator, etc. (about 5 wires total including the ground strap) to a single bolt on the main mounting plate just above the regulator.
I personally can't think of why this could possibly be the wrong approach to grounding, but who knows, I've definitely been wrong before. Is there any reason not to ground all of theses devices directly to the battery?
