control box locked up?

[wildmaninal]

I am running into problems left and right on this motor and control box of mine. The type of control box I have is the style with the warm up lever, it is hooked to my '78 evinrude 85hp. I bought a ball to install on the spring in the control box. Obviously when I took the control box off of the other boat to install it on to my bass boat last year I lost that ball, well I just replaced it today.

Thinking that this ball would cure my problem I reassembled the control box and without the motor running I go to test the controls by putting it in forward gear and then bringing it back to neutral then try to put it in reverse and it will not go, it won't even make contact with the neutral switch to allow me to turn the motor over with the key.

I have had this control box apart several times already, and the same thing happens over and over. I have been able to reassemble the control box and then put it in reverse then to forward gear then back to neutral then the same thing occurs. I did adjust the shift cable just a little bit thinking this might cure the problem but it did not. I have also disconnected the shift cable from the motor to see what would happen, nothing changed. I have adjusted the tensioner nob and this did not help.

Any ideas?

 

[F_R]

Re: control box locked up?

The control lever attaches to a semi-circular part inside called a "shift & throttleplate" part number 318185 . That meshes with a lever called a "shift lever assembly" part number 386542. The mechanism is what I call a "one-tooth gear" for lack of a better description. When those "one-tooth" parts get worn, things start to jam up.
View the parts at www.shop.evinrude.com

 

[wildmaninal]

Re: control box locked up?

This is bad! My best bet would be to find a used control box in decent shape or price the parts for this one.

I was thinking this was going to be a matter of me putting this control box back together wrong but I guess I might of been doing it right.

I took the control box apart the lever would be in the neutral position, then I would find that the lip is no where near the neutral switch. I go to reset assuming that it was still in neutral, making sure the lip hits the neutral switch then it just locks up. When it locks up I can put it in forward gear but nothing else.

Thanks for the reply FR.

 

[tashasdaddy]

Re: control box locked up?

i just had one go bad also. the plastic shift geat crapped out.

 

[wildmaninal]

Re: control box locked up?

Well hmmm. I already know approximately how much the part number 386542 is going to cost. I haven't been able to find a price on 318185 by looking on the internet. "www.shop.evinrude.com" actually had 386542 cheaper then this other website I was viewing. Still neither had the other part.

All I can say is there goes my plans for taking the boat out this weekend and maybe even next weekend. I heard they were cleaning the lake this weekend anyway, would of been allot of traffic most likely.

 

[Joe Reeves]

Re: control box locked up?

In addition to the above (bad shift lever tooth), the thought occurred to me that since the engine is not running, when attempting to shift from forward to reverse, you are simply having the face of the dog lobes run into the face of the gear lobes.

Have someone spin the propeller when shifting with the engine not running to have the shifting lobes match up.

 

[wildmaninal]

Re: control box locked up?

In addition to the above (bad shift lever tooth), the thought occurred to me that since the engine is not running, when attempting to shift from forward to reverse, you are simply having the face of the dog lobes run into the face of the gear lobes.

Have someone spin the propeller when shifting with the engine not running to have the shifting lobes match up.

Alright I'll try that. Although I know it locked up me 2 times while running the motor, that is something I may not have mentioned. I went to throttle it up just a little bit, the darn motor rived but died then the control box locked up.

 

[ezeke]

Re: control box locked up?

Leaders Marine has one on Ebay right now. Search "318185".

 

[tashasdaddy]

Re: control box locked up?

make sure it's the control that is locked up. check the motor by manual shifting.

 

[wildmaninal]

Re: control box locked up?

Alright I'll check it out TD, I seriously think that it is in the control box though, it would not hurt to check it out like you said.

I think my bad luck on the shifting is contagious my brother is having problems with his boat it won't go into reverse although his control will move into the reverse position. We went out fishing today in his boat.

Ezeke I'll look at that also.

Thanks to all for the replies.

 

[wildmaninal]

Re: control box locked up?

Well I undone the shift cable and manually shifted the motor while running it and it did shift out with no problems. I can feel it grab the gear when shifting it, and I am able to shift it with my fingers. The only thing is I couldn't tell if the prop shaft was turning correctly because I was running it in a barrel this time, I assume that it is turning because you can tell a difference in the way the motor was running, it did have a load on it in other words. So the problem must be in the control box. $75 for the throttle plate at the local marina , I believe I might look into getting that one off of the internet and save nearly $35.

The local marina was fair on the price for the shift lever assembly/386542 though $31 for it.