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Battery died, now cranks and won't start

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Michael Nowak

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Help! First timer here.  My Bennington ran fine and the battery died because I left the key on. I jump started it with a portable jump starter and it fired up and started immediately.  I drove it five minutes to get it home and shut it off.  About four hours later I went to start it again and the battery was still dead.  I put the same portable jump starter on it and it cranks over perfectly, but it won't fire at all.  The primer bulb is firm. Any ideas?
 
Do you have the safety connected?
 
I'm not a mechanic by trade, but it could be that with your battery going down so fast, you may have enough to turn over the motor, but not enough to actually crank it. Try charging your battery rather than just jumping it off. 


On another note, since it's a 2011, have you checked to see the contents of the gas tank? You don't know what fuel has been used in it, and it might have lots of water in it. Check the fuel filters. Without proper maintenance, those will clog up on you, and prevent cranking/running. 
 
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Thanks.  Going to get a charger on it and see if it fires after the battery is fully charged.  With the tank, wouldn't there be some signs in performance prior or even a little attempt to fire when turning it over if it was water or a clog?
 
Is it the original battery ? 
 
If you take the cowling off your motor, you will find a fuse that controls the starting function, check that fuse, if you are looking at the motor from the boat the fuse should be on the upper left.
 
Did you get any notification from the dealer that sold it to you, that they had gone through it to be sure it was up to par? You mentioned firing, so have you pulled the plugs to see if they are in good shape?
 
Yup give it a good full charge and try it again. You were able to jump start it but you only let it run for 5 minutes. That's not nearly enough time for your alternator/charging system to fully charge your battery........


You said it ran fine before this happened. You'll be all right........
 
High probability it just needs a good charge, especially if you left the key on.


If you were driving it slow before it died, the alternator may not have been generating enough to charge it while running, and the motor pulled the voltage down and it died. 


A full discharge is bad for a battery. Worse the older it is.  If you still have trouble, take the battery in for a load test.  
 
Well, here's the scoop.  I used a couple different jump starters for the battery and the motor turned over fast and just did not spark.  Checked fuses and plugs and connections and whatnot to no success.  Replaced the battery and it works like a champ!  Crazy because I always thought if you can get the engine to turn over that it would fire regardless of how dead the battery was, but apparently not.  Thanks everyone for your feedback.  Great forum!  Michael
 
Don't go too far from the dock with that boat just yet....  That should not have fixed it. You may have some other intermittent problem.  


Boat up river for a while...
 
Michael Nowak said:
Well, here's the scoop.  I used a couple different jump starters for the battery and the motor turned over fast and just did not spark.  Checked fuses and plugs and connections and whatnot to no success.  Replaced the battery and it works like a champ!  Crazy because I always thought if you can get the engine to turn over that it would fire regardless of how dead the battery was, but apparently not.  Thanks everyone for your feedback.  Great forum!  Michael
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Not sure about a smaller motor like that but on the bigger ones, there may be plenty of voltage and current to spin the starter, but the ignition and any electronic modules may have insufficient voltage to work properly. I'm inclined to agree with Kaydano though, that something else may still be going on.
 
Glad you made good progress. That's got to be in our aging to you. Enjoy. 
 
Now you have me wondering,does the motor have electronic ignition? If so,the battery may had a bad cell that played havoc on the ECU. The ECU's are sensitive enough to voltage drops that they won't operate correctly. Hope that's the case for you! Good luck.
 
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