Boat looses power, pops, backfires, gets all nasty

[chadwick02]

Yes, the boat is in the water. I will swap one thing out at a time and take it for a spin.

I want to know what the culprit is too

[chadwick02]

***************PROBLEM SOLVED***********

I went to replace the coil, and noticed that one of the wires was badly damaged and frayed right where it enters the molded plastic plug. It was the pink and brown wire that connects the Ignition Control Module below the rotor, to the coil. It was the brown wire in particular that had issues. All the copper strands inside the wire had become broken, and the wire was only holding on by a thread of the plastic jacket. My guess is someone jammed a test probe into the wire right at the connector, allowing moisture to enter causing the wire to oxidize and to become very brittle. It’s a wonder the thing ran at all. The damage was flush with the end of the connector. There was no chance of splicing the wire or somehow re-attaching it to the connector. So, I cut of the connector, striped the wires down, and jammed them into the coil. A lot of tape and some zip ties to hold it all in, and the boat runs great!! Put almost 10 hours on it this weekend , and must have made about 20 passes through the course in a matter of 3 days!! I can hardly move now.

Thanks again to everyone for all the great advice and ideas.