Marinette Boat Forum

Here's a photo of the switches in the engine bay. The right/starboard switch was switched off. The left/port switch is in fact on even though it is pointing to off (the switch and label/plate are not aligned).

Hmmm. I thought by 1977 Marinette was using different battery switches unless a previous owner did some custom wiring. The toggle switches on each side look different too. The 2 center toggles almost look like momentary/ignition??? Nothing is labeled..... I'm not totally sure how the late 70s models were setup... Several years ago I rewired a bridge on a 1976, 37' sedan and I don't recall running into anything like this in the engine room or bridge.

Darn - was hoping it would look familiar! The lack of labels is... fun?

I have 1979 Sedan Bridge and those are the same switches that are on mine as well. What are you needing exactly?

Hi Bigarrn, That's good to hear! So they are original after all.

I'm trying to understand the purpose of the larger switches and the adjacent toggle switches to help diagnose some electrical issues I'm having.

Hi alps, I spoke with the previous owner of the '76 that I worked on. He bought it in 1995 and it had the red Guest battery switches in the engine room. I'm assuming the original owner did the upgrade.
One rotating switch should be for the port battery and the other for the starboard battery. Do you have more than 2 batteries??

The 2 outboard silver toggles might be the 12V accessory switches. Port side and starboard side of boat.
The 2 center toggles that look like ignition toggles may be for the bilge pumps? For some reason Marinette went crazy with bilge pump switches and included multiple toggles for the bilge pumps. I would like to know why they used 3 toggles per pump at the lower helm and 1 toggle each on the bridge.
The 2 black toggles may be for 12DC refrigerator and maybe a macerator?

The black center box is the fume detector. The molex connector with the colored wires should be connected to that box and go up to maybe the lower helm to a fume detector. I think the original units from your vintage were round or oval and had a couple of colored lights.

Can't hurt to start flipping switches 1 at a time and see if anything turns on/off or make a noise.

Thanks GB49! Really great to hear about the '76 that you worked on as a comparable.

Haven't started flipping those switches, but I did find the problem!! First, to answer your question, she has two "marine" 12 volt batteries and a third 12v battery that's more of an automotive size. Not sure what role that one is playing.

I investigated the battery charger through the hatch under the stairs and sure enough an inline 30 amp fuse was out. As soon as I got a new fuse in there (temporarily stolen from my truck's rear power windows, lol), things started coming back on as they should - at least as far as I knew it before the problem showed up. After a day or two of charging, the depleted starboard battery is now showing 12-13v and and I have cabin lights, radio, auto function on the bilge pumps, among other things... but most importantly I have the blower and both ignitions back.

New problems... After not having the engines running for a couple months, they seemed to want some coaxing. I sprayed some starter fluid (as I've done before) into the carb of the port engine - usually the "good one" out fo the two - it caught, revved up, cut as I pulled the ignition back, and now the starter doesn't appear to crank the motor over... did I kill my starter or seize my motor, yikes!!

Starter now makes an electrical motor sound but doesn't seem to want to crank the motor at all... time for more troubleshooting.

A few more photos:

Keep an eye on the charger fuses. Looks like the batteries are newer but one may be bad/failing and causing the charger to pop a fuse. Can you verify battery voltage while trying to crank that engine that wont start? I'd bet either the starting solenoid or battery is bad. Generally those are the 2 main issues if a known working engine wont turn over. The starter may also be bad but I'd lean toward the other 2 items first. You can pull the starter and have it tested. If memory serves I had one of my starters tested at Napa auto store many years ago. Might call around and ask before pulling it.

Final thought on the engine issues is to start a new thread in the "Drivetrain" section of this forum. FastJeff will certainly be able to assist more on the engine side of things.

-Karl

Thanks so much, Karl! Appreciate all your help here. I'll start a thread in the drivetrain section as soon as I can get down and investigate a little more first. Need to also get into the steering a bit so will be posting there as well.

Happy holidays!

Andrew