Mercury Bigfoot 60 EFi losing rpms at higher speed

[SCsailor]

I have a 2006 Mercury Bigfoot 60hp efi. Just today it started losing RPMs at high speed. The power drops and comes back up, a minute or so it happens again. This just started today. The gas was fresh, filled up today. Also, within the last month I replaced the fuel line and primer bulb. It worked great two weeks ago. Last time I ran it, I ran out of gas. Any ideas? Thanks so much.

 

[Jeep Man]

Re: Mercury Bigfoot 60 EFi losing rpms at higher speed

First guess would be fuel filters. I believe there are two on that engine. You may have sucked up some crud from the tank when you ran dry. They are not the easiest to replace. I had an inline filter added to mine to make them last longer and facilitate a quick repair.
Worst case scenerio would require getting the injectors cleaned, but let's not go there yet.
Final thought, depending on your boat, you may have a filter at the tank. Mine does, and that was my culprit.

 

[SCsailor]

Re: Mercury Bigfoot 60 EFi losing rpms at higher speed

Thanks for the reply. Here is an update. I took it to the shop this morning. I asked the Mercury mechanic about running out of gas and sucking up some crud from the bottom of the tank. He said not likely - the pickup tube is at the bottom of the tank anyway, any garbage down there would have been sucked up before running out of gas. The more likely scenario seems to be that I did not have the vents on the tank fully open, which is true. Duh. I left it with him to check out but the culprit seems to be my not fully opening the vents. Live and learn. I'll report back on what he finds.