electric and hydro-electric shift

I own one of the hydro-electric shift models and was wondering why did omc design this type of shift?

was it an advertizing ploy to "appear" ahead of the compition?

was it trully supposed to be more reliable, easier to repair?

another thought i had, was it supposed to be better for the clutch dog since you can't shift it too slow?

did any other manufacturer have a similar style?

And lastly why did they do away with it?

Re: electric and hydro-electric shift

Omc had many clutch dog failures in the early 60s and thought they could repair it with the electric shift without going to differant type of clutch dog system, they then went to that magnetic operated spool shift and it was not very reliable either, so they tied a to use a shift dog that worked simular to mercurys system but was not operated with a cam and pin mechanically but a hyd. system to operate it, it was also troublesome and was switched to a mechanically operated shift, isn't pride just awful, well at lest costly

Re: electric and hydro-electric shift

Nope. Back in the 60s, pushbutton shift was all the rage in automobiles. No levers, just push a button for park, drive, neutral, or reverse. Johnnyrude wanted to join the bandwagon (with plenty of prodding by the public I'm sure) and designed the Selectric gearcase. Problem with those was if the electrical system had a problem, you were stuck in neutral. The motor could be running just fine, but you go nowhere. So they devised the Hydroelectric so that at least it would default to forward and get you home. But there were more problems than it was worth and they scrapped the idea altogether. I'm sure production costs for the system far exceeded simple mechanical shift as well. The bottom line usually moves such things in whatever direction makes the numbers bigger and blacker.

Re: electric and hydro-electric shift

OMC made a big deal about the gearcases staying if forward if there were any electrical failures or water in the case etc. A type of "fail-safe", you could always get home.

The down side is that it's in gear when you engage the starter and as soon as you sut the key off. There are components on the motor to make sure it goes to neutral as soon as (or almost as soon as) you engage the starter and to keep it in neutral as long as the flywheel is turning.

However, there were some cases that the motor was in neutral, the operator advanced the throttle and then shut the key off and it banged into gear because that system (that kept it in neutral) had went bad. The boat could then bang into a dock or another boat or lurch forward. There was some stories that OMC got sued (someone got hurt) and the government declared that as of 1973 every outboard had to have a "positive neutral".

Once you understand it, they're a very simple gearcase to work on. You can actually take everything out of the case except for the drive shaft, forward gear, pump and solenoids without taking the unit off the motor.