I have a 1995 Crownline 18ft with a Mercruiser 4.3 lx engine that I bought at the beginning of the season. Has been running fine. I took a short trip yesterday from my dock to the fuel dock. Instruments were hopping all around. When we got to the fuel dock and shut off the engine I heard a faint buzzing sound under the instrument console. Put fuel on board, went to start and nothing. checked battery and connections and all looked good. Even got a hot shot, still nothing. crawled under the panel and there was the buzzing sound. finally realized it was the low oil pressure/high temp warning buzzer. The prior owner had apparently wrapped electrical tape around it to mute the buzzing. By the way, key was in off position and it was still buzzing. I had limited tools with me so I got a tow back to the marina. I'll be troubleshooting tonight. Any suggestions on where to start and what procedures to follow. I'm thinking starting at the engine wiring harness plug to see if there is corrosion there and then working forward.
Update:
Got to the boat last night, pulled the main wiring harness plug from the motor, checked prongs replugged and reconnected the battery and it started right up. Gauges looked normal for a bit and then started dancing around again. I shut down and tried a restart and same issue as yesterday. Buzzer going. No accessories would work. When I hit the toggle switch for the different accessories(blower,bilge,nav lights…) the buzzer got louder and none of the accessories worked. I plugged and unplugged the main harness with no change. Crawled under the dash and fount the p.o. Had wired in the stereo in a bizarre fashion. Somehow wired two wires into the oil pressure gauge. Didn’t have a socket or nut driver with me to disconnect them. Then the rain started….I’ll get back to it tomorrow.
Update:
Got to the boat last night, pulled the main wiring harness plug from the motor, checked prongs replugged and reconnected the battery and it started right up. Gauges looked normal for a bit and then started dancing around again. I shut down and tried a restart and same issue as yesterday. Buzzer going. No accessories would work. When I hit the toggle switch for the different accessories(blower,bilge,nav lights…) the buzzer got louder and none of the accessories worked. I plugged and unplugged the main harness with no change. Crawled under the dash and fount the p.o. Had wired in the stereo in a bizarre fashion. Somehow wired two wires into the oil pressure gauge. Didn’t have a socket or nut driver with me to disconnect them. Then the rain started….I’ll get back to it tomorrow.
