Got up real early Saturday morning and was one of the first to launch. Backed the boat down and went to pull the boat off the trailer and my outboard wouldnt crank...I wasn't a happy camper when that happened... had that boat 9years and has never failed to crank once! I pulled the engine cowl off and started looking around the engine. Didn't find anything. By this time it is good and daylight. I happened to look down at my kill switch and then looked closer....my kill switch lanyard looked to still be attached to the switch but the switch was tripped. It finally hit....my 16 month old daughter likes to play in my boat sometimes and she evidently had pulled the lanyard just hard enough to trip the switch....LOL....Gota love those kids! I'm glad that's all that was wrong.

Amen. . . had a cousin of mine about to fish a fireman vs. police tournament on lewisville a few yrs ago. Couldn't get it started. Worked on it for a solid hr. Called me and i tried to give him the walk around. Gave him a number to my guy who works on motors. couldn't get it started. Pulled the boat out of the water. Was basically calling it a day and was just going to hang around. Started to put everything up in his boat and when he got to his jackets realized the kill switch lanyard was attached to his jacket away from the switch. Flipped the switch and fired right up. He lost about 2 1/2 hrs of fishing time. I never thought to check it while I was on the phone with him but since then. . . its the first thing I do. I'm sure plenty more have stories like that!

Had a "no start problem" a few years back. Son and I went to Cedar Creek one every early morning. Wanted to get on the water at first light.

Got to the ramp, backed the boat down, hit the switch and nothing.

Pulled the boat back out of the water, tied everything back down and headed to Wal-mart.

Got to Wal-mart and pulled the battery out of the boat. Took it in and a guy in the auto shop tested it. He told me there was nothing wrong with the battery.

Put the battery back in the boat and bumped the key and the motor fired right up.

It was a dirty battery post that caused the problem.

So much for first light fishing.

at least you figured it out before heading back home and taking it to your mechanic.

A couple friends and I went to Caddo (1.5 Hours away) one morning to fish. Got there at 5:45 AM, just can barely see. Perfect. Took my friends boat and he had checked everything out the day before and everything ran fine. Got there and backed it down and it would not fire. First thing he checked was kill switch. It was hooked up and looked fine. We spent the next 15 minutes trying everything before giving up. We launched and decided to fish everything we could reach with the TM. Later on he was still thinking about it and he disconnected the kill swith and then reconnected it. Fired right up. He was so mad he could have killed something. it looked fine but it was just slightly tripped.

Once my brother forgot our trolling motor batteries. Don't ask me how because i still don't know. But I guarantee it will never happen again.

Many years ago, lake fork, 3am , 175 merc wouldnt crank, went to a knowledgeable friends house woke him up and standing in his doorway at 4am in his drawers, he looked , said trim the motor down, we did ,it cranked , and later that evening he ate a big steak ... On us!! (There is a microswitch on that model that disables starter if motor is trimmed up more than 60 degrees)

Been there done that!

I do a complete once over the day before I go out just to make sure everything is working properly so I'm not tying anybody up at the ramp. If I'm going to have to tweak on something I want to do it during daylight hours and with the tools and supplies I need readily available.

First time I did that was at a tournament on Hubbard creek I was mad until I looked down and saw that the latch was down from when I stood up to get the trolling motor with the lanyard still attached I had forgotten about hooking it back up!

Quite a few replies about the kill switch. I had my motor die on me repeatedly towards the end of a day on the water. Could not figure it out. Even though the lanyard was attached after the third or fourth time I held the kill switch out and it started back up and wouldn't die. I had a spare lanyard and hooked it up and the problem was solved. I guess the old one was just worn down and would not hold the switch out far enough.

Got up early headed to the lake. Got everything ready to unload Backed the boat in and realized I had left all my rods at home. That's not a good start to any day!

Must have been a Mercury. That has happened to me with them. Yamaha alarm system will go off when you try to crank to let you know.

Checklist when boat won't start:
1). Check kill switch
2). Check to make sure shifter is in neutral

"I pulled the engine cowl off and started looking around the engine. Didn't find anything."

I almost thought that was your problem right there, your engine was missing.

I had the same issue you had for the same reason, my friend's kids were obviously in my boat and tripped the kill switch. I blew the post off a battery trying to start it before I realized it.