Frustrating Simple Fix

[stanlje2]

Almost two months ago my boat died just outside the no wake zone after a day of fishing. None of the cylinders were firing when I got it home. I took it to my local boat shop and they kept it for three weeks and charged me $140 in labor to tell me that there was nothing wrong with it. When they tried to start it, it ran fine. Obviously I disagreed but took it home and hit the lake the next day only to get stranded about 3 miles from the boat ramp. Lucky me, my trolling motor batteries had a full charge and a couple hours later after fighting a 20mph head wind I made it back to the ramp. Took it back to the shop and two weeks and $106 later I was informed that my kill switch was cracked. So all said, I lost almost 2 months of spring fishing (boat sat in my garage 2 weeks) and $250 in mostly labor costs for a $14 part. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy it was a simple and cheap fix but it has been frustrating.

[GrundleLove]

Why the HELL would you ever pay that repair shop for that? i would have told them to go screw their blind aunt and actually asked for my original 140 in labor back

[quanjig]

I would find a new mechanic if they put the screws to you twice like that!! That is not the way to get repeat business in my book!

[fadetoblack21]

This is part of the reason I try to find the problem myself first, then take it to a mechanic if I cannot find out whats wrong. I have been taken by an auto mechanic once and I guess that bad experience has carried over to the boating world for me.

[radtech]

I recently had the same problem about a 1/2 mile from jp coleman! No way I could make it back on trolling motor alone fighting wind and current. Took me about 2 hours to get it fixed. Had to make a few phone calls till someone thought to check the kill switch. GRRRR had to dismantle the whole throttle assembly and just take the switch out of the loop to get the boat to crank! Needless say it sucks and made for a burnt run to pickwick!

[Tony Monticelli]

not to say you got hosed without knowing the mechanics side..

i mean it sounds like allot but if it was something to do with the electronics etc i have yet to meet a mechanic that wants to work on that, time is money, usually kill more time than they can afford to trying to find a simple stupid little problem..

i know the people i get my 4wheeler snowmobiles etc.. i had an electrical issue with my 4wheeler and he told me flat out that he doesn't know me that it was an electrical problem, check all the connection i can find and try to fix it myself LOL lucky for me 4 hours of pulling on wires i found a bad connection fixed it and problem solved..

[stanlje2]

I did search for quite a while to try to figure the problem out but didn't think to look at the kill switch for cracks. I'll take my business elsewhere in the future. Sometimes you want to kick yourself in the ass when a simple problem like that beats you. I consider myself pretty mechanically inclined but I just dropped the ball on this one.