Honda 50hp No Acceleration

I have a 2001 - 3 carb 50hp honda that will not accelerate after running fine at WOT, going about 26mph. Starts fine, but when I stop to fish for about 15min it will hesitate, seems to choke out and die out if I try to restart and apply throttle. Had the carbs reworked back in 4/2009. I'm using fuel additives and have a water seapartor too.

Re: Honda 50hp No Acceleration

How often do you use the motor? I have a 2008 50hp and the dealership I bought it from said the number one problem with these motors is fuel sitting in the carburetors for extended periods and clogging the small orifices. The dealership recommended running the engine dry of fuel for layups of a month or more. Not sure if this is your problem if the motor starts and runs good at WOT during the initial startup.

Re: Honda 50hp No Acceleration

I had a similar problem last year after a service. It turned out that one of the clamps on the fuel line was sucking a bit of air.

Easy tests to see if its the problem or not is to:

A. pump up your fuel and see if the fuel bulb is hard or soft at the end of it. If the bulb never gets fully hard, it could be sucking air from somewhere.
B. operate the engine at WOT for a couple of minutes, back off the accellerator to about 1/2 throttle for about 2 minutes then suddenly go to WOT again. If it hesitates or cuts out completely, it could be sucking air.

In my case I found a clamp that whilst tight, had been overtightened and wasnt making a good seal. I took the clamp off, cut about 1 inch off the hose, put a new clamp on, pushed it back onto the fitting and tightened it and the problem went away.

Hope it helps