Boat won't start

[JoeG]

So it would be the perfect weekend ..family in town,water is glass and the boat won't start . Backed down to the ramp turn on battery went to turn the boat on and nothing but one click then all power was lost dash, ballast won't turn on ,anything that's not wired direct to battery is dead . Pulled battery and had it checked it was good look around at fuses I could find didn't see anything . Where do I start to diagnose this problem local marina service dept is backed up for a month. 08 rz4 with 5.7 marine power thanks joe

[freeheel4life]

Right off the bat sounds like starter bit the dust but that's a pretty premature armchair diagnosis.
First get yourself a decent multimeter, and learn how to use it. Then start by checking open circuit voltage on batteries. Ideally they will be 12.4-12.6v. Batteries get exponentially weaker below this, 11.8v is a dead battery. Then go to B+ cable at starter and see if you have voltage (should read same as batteries within a .1 of a volt.) Then have someone key over ignition while checking S terminal (smaller yellow wire with red stripe) of starter. If you see 12v when key is turned then starter is bad.

[Wakeman22]

Do not go to starter direct but do a tests to eliminate other factors. Is the battery switch bad? Turn it on and off. Check voltage. Check connections. Check kill switch. Check to see if it is in gear. Jump the starter over to see if it will engage if you know how. Very easy. Since you have no power to other accessories it is not the starter anyway. There are some splice connections that get corroded sometimes and the cause problems. It is probably a simple fix you just need to locate it. I would start at the battery. Then move down the chain of wires to the next point. then the next. But use a multi meter or test light probe.

If it was just the starter only and all other electrical was working I would not go to starter first but would test the relay. But I seriously doubt that is the issue. Sounds more like a bad connection someplace. I was once plagued by the same thing. Shop could not figure it out. So as I was looking to trace it down a splice connection by the battery fell apart in my hand. I told the shop about it and they said, "oh yeah, I remember the PO had the same problem" Duh! Would have saved weeks of frustration.

[dj2]

My 08 RZ4 has a manual reset circuit breaker that cannot be seen without removing the entire battery cover. Check for that in the corner behind/next to the batteries, not sure if it is factory or not.

Here is a link of what it looks like

[JoeG]

Hey dj can you resend that link

[Thegerman618]

did you check your battery for volts only or did you load test it?

Make sure you load test if you didn't I spent weeks looking for a problem only to find out under load test my batteries were toast.

[JoeG]

After digging around found the battery switch nut was loose should be back on the water this weekend. Thanks for all the advise and surfs up

[dj2]

Glad you figured out the problem, just checked back and saw the link wasn't posted.

Sorry