Mercury xr2 struggles cranking

[boudreux]

I have a Mercury 150 XR2. I was cranking fine and then all of a sudden it doesn't want to crank. I took it out the other day and it took 5 minutes of cranking before it would finally crank. I thought maybe some water had gotten in the gas so I replaced it with fresh gas but nothing has changed. When it finally does crank up it seems to run fine and as long as i don't sit in one spot to long it will crank up again on the first try, but if i fish in one spot for a while i have the same problems cranking it. Any suggestions?

 

[ccchampion26]

Re: Mercury xr2 struggles cranking

Your problem sounds like the problem my XR6 150 had. Same situation. Though my motor was trying to turn over but seemed as though i had a dead battery. If this is what your cranking motor sounds like than your problem may be solved like my motor. My cables connecting the battery to the motor were bad along with the connections being in poor condition or corroded. I replaced them and it starts every crank now., also my floats were sticking and flooding the carbs so i was fortunate to use some sea foam in the fuel and it corrected that problem. Make sure the fuel line has good connection and the primer bulb doesn't have a leak - that gave me a similar problem with a hard to start motor. Good Luck

 

[j_martin]

Re: Mercury xr2 struggles cranking

Please define your terms. Cranking refers to spinning the motor over with the starter. Poor cranking is slow turning, or not at all.

Firing, on the other hand, is when the engine comes to life.

Does it crank slow, or is it failing to fire?

They are often related. All the spark is generated by the rotation of the engine, totally isolated from battery power. Slow cranking usually will make it difficult to get enough spark to start.

Slow cranking could be caused by anything, and sometimes it gets confusing. I just lost cranking speed while on an outing, and noted the voltage taking a dive at the same time. I quickly decided the battery had finally given up the ghost, and bought a $40 battery at a marina for $80. It only helped a very little.

When I got home, I checked starting current, and found it at 250 amps. It should be a little over 100. When I tore down the starter, I found the entire brush set in a pile at the bottom, filling up the end cap till it shorted out the armature. No wonder it took so much current.

$5 to turn the armature, $5 for a used set of brushes (new will take a week to get, or cost almost $30). Cleaned it up and threw it back together, and all is good. I'll be testing it at sunrise tomorrow.

hope it helps
John

 

[boudreux]

Re: Mercury xr2 struggles cranking

Sorry about the terms. Yes when i turn the key it will crank fine so and i have recently replaced the battery so its not that. It just takes it forever to fire up. I'm guessing its either a spark problem or a fuel delivery problem but not positive about the fuel because when it does fire, i can smell a little gas like its gotten too much