TOPIC: Mercury KE-7 restoration - completed

I have been working on a rebuild of Merc KE-7 Lightning that a friend gave me when he heard I was restoring my 1963 Lone Star Triton. Turns out that he used the motor on a hydroplane in college in the 60's, but then had it break down. He was taking a class to fix it in the '70's, but ran out of ambition and just boxed up the parts. It has been sitting in his garage attic for 40+ years!!

With a little parts sourcing for points and some fabrication and welding of parts, we have it firing. I just need to source a replacement impeller for the water pump, and potentially the lower cowls. I was hoping that someone could help me out on finding parts without breaking the bank.

Here are some pics of how I received it and its current - almost finished product.

The ebay item id given is invalid, no result has been sentthere's this.....

Got one ordered from Ferguson-Poole. Thanks to everyone. I will post some pics when we have it in the water.

Got the new impeller yesterday and put her back together. See the video for the results. Just need to do some carb cleaning and tuning.




Anyone have suggestions for initial settings for a KE-7 carb?

high speed set at 1 1/2 out from lightly turning it in.
low speed if the screw goes in from the side light setting then out 3/4 turn if from the front 1 1/2 out

Thanks! The carb is very sensitive to those settings and runs rich really easy.

Got the motor in the water last Thursday and got the carb pretty close. Even took it for a spin but didn't give it full throttle. Left it on the back of the rowboat for further adjustments the next day....



Very windy overnight and the waves knocked the newly restored motor in about a foot of water. Found it Friday morning - at first I thought someone stole it until I saw it under the water. Kind of a bummer!!!!



Just got it dried out and running again today. Seems no worse for the experience. I would upload video, but I will need to figure out how to convert it into a .gif of a reasonable size

I would upload video, but I will need to figure out how to convert it into a .gif of a reasonable size

The easiest way is to upload you video to a hosting site like YouTube, and post the link here.

Thanks Mark. I will try to doing that now.