Starter replacement issue

[Eastboundndown]

I’m thinking I was probably given the wrong starter but figured I’d check with you all before I tear it back out. I replaced my starter because the drive(bendix ) quit and starter was just spinning without engaging flywheel. So I bolt on a newbie, reconnect wires and as soon as I turn my battery sw on to test the starter starts running without turning key. This one did not engaging drive either though. I’m just wondering if maybe what I thought was a bad starter could be a bad slave solenoid instead. It’s a 5.7 merc. 260 stern drive with alpha one out. Thx

 

[Bondo]

Ayuh,...... Pull the yellow/red wire off the slave, 'n see,......

 

[alldodge]

There are several 260's and a year would help, but serial number is better.

What starter did you get?

Take a pic of the starter wiring and post.

 

[Eastboundndown]

I don’t have a lot of information on motor. It has Thunderbolt 4 ignition, and I am almost positive it is pre-1991 set up. I already tried pulling the yellow wire off and just got a click when I tried to turn over. The thing that I’m wondering is the connections on the starter has two small studs to pull in the 2 big studs for cranking amps. I have orange(from alt.), red (from battery) and yellow from slave. The connections On the one I removed were red, red, orange on 1 of the big studs, the lead to the starter on the other big stud and yellow from slave on small stud and nothing at all on the 2nd small stud. So I wired the new one the same way but wasn’t sure if aftermarket starter may require to be wired differently

 

[alldodge]

The top post gets the Orange from the Alt, Red/Purple from the 50 amp breaker, and Red cable from the battery

The yellow/red goes on the small post closest to the motor. The Yellow/red is used to energize the starter from the slave solenod when the key is turned to start

You should also have a 90 amp fuse (square thing) which the orange wire would be connected to.

 

[Eastboundndown]

I don’t have fuse and I don’t have yellow/purple wire but I have a mechanical fuel pump. I think I had a bad ground. I tried jumping out safety sw, cut out, slave and no luck. I was pulling starter out figuring it was junk so After I unbolted it And pulling it up next to motor to undo wire connections It hit the side of riser and I seen a spark so I looked over and realized I had forgotten to shut battery sw. off. Thank god I made that mistake because I didn’t think to check for a bad ground.. so I cleaned grounds and turned the sw back on and the sound of the drive engaging was music to my ears! Thank You guys, I appreciate the assistance!