Hello! I had this boat in the shop back in July for this same issue. They said the motor worked fine and here I am - still won't start. This motor has left me stranded a couple of times, and is getting quite frustrating to have to troll from quite a ways away.
The motor when cold, will start by normally choking. Pushing the key and turn. Unfortunately, it will almost always die. You have to continuously push on the key to keep choking it. Once you get underway, the motor will run what I believe is normally. Anytime you slow to down to come to a stop, the motor always dies. It will not restart without a choke, even after 20 minutes. When it does restart, it will often die again, and have to be started however many more times, before the engine will get underway again.
Several times now, the motor after being on the water for an hour, will refuse to start at all. It will turn over, but wont' catch - or even more fun, is when it will turn on, but you have to keep pressure on the hotfoot to keep it running, and then as soon as you put it in gear, it will immediately die and it will do this over and over.
Here are 3 videos of what it's doing, if you know anything about this engine, please try and help me! I know very little!