Omc ESA Wiring

[OmcOwner2]

Hello again fellow iboaters

A few of you may remember my post many months back:

http://forums.iboats.com/showthread.php?t=177223.

Well I finally got some time in the last few weeks to start working on my project again. After going through the tilt mechanism completely and getting that working excellent, I'm ready to tackle the ESA upgrade.

I found myself the correct shift converter box. I also purchased a shift module 123-9898-P from CDI/rapair.

The converter box should be piece of cake to install since I already removed the old one and the newer model is pretty much identical. The only thing I need to figure out is how to wire the module. From reading through old posts and my Seloc manual it looks like the blue and black wire go to the interrupt switch. It's the purple and gray wires that I'm not sure about. From looking at wiring diagrams from newer models it looks like the gray wire goes to the negative side of the coil. But where does the purple wire go?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[steve31]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

Hi,
Don't know if this will help, but the wiring on my 93 Cobra esa is gray/black wire to negative side of coil and purple wire to positive side of coil. The solid gray wire on mine goes to the tachometer. My engine is a 5.0l Ford with a prestolite solid state distributor.

 

[Boatin Bob]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

The purple wire is the 12v feed for the ESA, I don't think I would wire it to the positive side of the coil pre 1993 as those should have electronic ignition and have 12v at the coil all the time. The older engines normally have a resistor wire or a ballast resistor to knock the voltage down to the coil while running. I don't have any wiring diagram in front of me but I seem to remember the purple is tied to a splice from the alternator to ensure it gets a constant 12v. The gray wire definitely goes to the negative side of the coil as that's how the ESA pulses (momentarily grounds) the coil.

 

[Coors]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

That's what my 1988 OMC manual shows.

 

[OmcOwner2]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

Thanks for the replys. It appears my model uses the resistor wire from the voltage regulator to the coil. I found another wiring diagram and it appears the same as you have mentioned. So it looks like I will need to splice in to that purple wire upstream of the resistor wire near the voltage regulator.

Thanks again for all the help.

 

[OmcOwner2]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

Well it seems my problems aren't with over yet. I finally got the boat on the water on saturday to test the new esa. The new system does make the engine sputter when shifted as it's supposed to. The problem is that the engine will not come out of the sputter unless you shut the ignition off and restart the motor. The engine then idles normal. The way I understand it is that the esa module is supposed to change the timing for a few seconds after the switch is triggered then revert back to normal. The switch seems to be working fine. Did I get a bad module or what?

ps: i'm going out of town later today and may not be able to post back for several days. Thanks.

 

[Coors]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

Shifter cable bad.

 

[OmcOwner2]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

Pretty sure the shift cable has nothing to do with my problem. It is either in the micro switch or the module assuming the wiring is correct. Anybody ever head of an esa module doing something like that?

 

[Coors]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

Watch the switch, while someone else shifts it; if it hangs on the detent- cable bad.

 

[whywhyzed]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

He has a stringer. Ditto on the suggestion to watch the switches and such while someone else shifts- sounds like the switch is staying depressed or something is just a hair off adjustment.

 

[OmcOwner2]

Re: Omc ESA Wiring

Had some time to take it out on the water today. After checking things out I found the shift cable was way out of adjustment and figured that was the problem. No such luck. After playing with things for a few minutes I discovered the engine runs normal with the micro switch depressed and sputters when not. This is the complete opposite of how I thought this whole ESA system worked. I tried switching the blue and black wires that go from the module to the switch since the module only has two blacks. No luck with that either. After looking it over some more, the only way I figure this could work is if there was suppose to be 3 detents. One for forward, one for reverse, and one for neutral. Then the switch would stay depressed in all 3 positions and not while changing between any of the three. Is this how it should be? My box only came with 2 detents. Never seen how one was setup, just going of info from this site. Does any one have a pic of how it should look? Did I buy the wrong esa module? Or maybe the micro switch isn't working correctly? I'm not sure what to think at this point. Any help would be great. Thanks.