'81 Evinrude 90 Stalls when going into gear

ezmobee

ezmobee

Supreme Mariner
Joined
Mar 26, 2007
Messages
23,767
My motor is a 1981 Evinrude 90. Just acquired it. Been sitting for a while and nothing has been done to it. The issue I am having is it stalls when going into gear. Otherwise it runs great. It starts instantly even from a cold start and will idle fine. Once you put it in forward it stalls. You can get around this if you are able to quickly lower the warm up lever and whip it into gear and give it gas. What confuses me is, I had this same problem with my '73 Johnson 85. However, the Johnson also didn't idle well and would cough and sneeze at idle. That was pretty much indicative of dirty low speed jets. This motor however, once you are IN gear, it's all good. You can throttle it back to idle and it will putt putt along all day long. That's making me wonder if it could be some sort of linkage problem. Weirder still is that fact that it doesn't do this nearly as bad going into reverse. Also, when sitting for perhaps a half hour, when I went to restart it, it wouldn't start until I pumped the ball up again. Tank was properly vented. It also absolutely doesn't do this at all when on muffs in my driveway. Just on the water. Any guesses?
 
kenmyfam

kenmyfam

Supreme Mariner
Joined
Aug 10, 2006
Messages
14,392
Re: '81 Evinrude 90 Stalls when going into gear

Clean carbs and how is the idle speed ???
 
vegasphotoman

vegasphotoman

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Jul 13, 2009
Messages
1,411
Re: '81 Evinrude 90 Stalls when going into gear

Ayuh....chuck it in the scrap heap...its a "Rude" lol

Hey Jeremy when did you become a :eek: MODERATOR? :eek:

Wish I knew more about outboards, Im of no help!
my 1990 Glastron with the 4 cyl mercruiser eng alpha one i/o
used to stall like that, ya had to go clank it in gear and gas it....
Ended up being = timing & carb overhaul took care of it...
after that, the motor ran like a raped ape....then ....after 1 year started getting less top end and a rougher idle..top speed down to 40mph....then after couple more trips it went flat and was coughin and weak...35mph...rough idle etc
Just found the timing was off...what happened? the centrifugal distributor springs were broke, no advance on the timing......it was maxing out from idle on the advance...

not sure how the newer outboards work thoough, if they are like the old ones...they have a lever that advances the timing as you throttle up, is that attached and working ok? loose? bent? hmmmm.......Im sure you know about all that jazz anyways...

.its something simple I bet!
l
 
oldrudedude

oldrudedude

Chief Petty Officer
Joined
Jul 3, 2008
Messages
480
Re: '81 Evinrude 90 Stalls when going into gear

At idle it doesn't have enough torque to overcome the inertia of the prop in the water. The problem is not as appearant in reverse because the gear ratio is lower. It is obviously not happy at idle. Since it has been sitting for a while dirty carbs would be highly suspect, but an other wise smooth idle would tend my opinion to lean more toward spark..... timing perhaps...too retarded?
 
ezmobee

ezmobee

Supreme Mariner
Joined
Mar 26, 2007
Messages
23,767
Re: '81 Evinrude 90 Stalls when going into gear

Thanks for the info oldrudedude. Especially the bit about the reverse gear ratio. That makes sense now. I plan to clean/rebuild the carbs and maybe crank up the idle speed a little bit. I need to get a tach installed so I know the idle RPMs. I'm not sure how to adjust the timing.
 
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