79 mercury 85hp shifting problem

[Rustyforever]

I changed the water pump impeller , I am having a lot of trouble getting the shifter splines aligned so the shifter works properly. I have spent hours with the lower unit up and down trying to get splines right. Finally used a pair of vise grips to turn shaft against spring tension to get it into neutral, Success! It's shifts forward , neutral, and reverse .....only backwards, so reverse is forward....found this out on the lake during test run. In reverse to go forwards, only get about 1500 RPM. Is that because it may have a limiter for reverse? Thanks for listening...steve

 

[Chris1956]

Your shifting is reversed because there are two neutrals. Drop the gearcase, control in neutral. Turn the lower shift shaft CCW until it again locks into neutral. Now reinstall the gearcase.

 

[Rustyforever]

Ok I'll try that, thanks. The shaft just spins with no clicks, that's normal?also Chris , is that why no speed in reverse?

 

[Chris1956]

When the motor is not running and in reverse, the prop will turn less than 1/3 of a full turn, before it locks to the driveshaft. If it freewheels, it is in neutral.

 

[Rustyforever]

I meant the shift shaft spins with no clicks sorry, so with the control in reverse to go forward, is the throttle limited because 1500 rpm is all it would go.

 

[Chris1956]

You would need to see how much the throttle in reverse will open the carbs. I would expect different controls to possibley have different limits. I do not think the motor itself has any limit to throttle in reverse. I know we pulled a water skier using reverse to go forward, before we fixed the shifter.