Hey there, Last week I bought a 1976 50hp mercury from a gentleman. I put it on my boat and ran it in water before I took it out. It fired right up and idled great. When I put it in reverse the shifter got stuck and wouldn't go back into neutral. I tried working it back and forth and nothing. So I asked my local shop. They told me to take the shifter box apart and check out the sprockets inside. I did and it looked like the shifter sprocket in the back is wearing down. So it slipped and wouldn't allow the middle one to rotate into neutral. So I took them out and reset everything. Put it back together started the motor up and put it I forward and reverse. All seemed to be working fine. So the next day I took the boat out to the lake. It fired right up and I took it cruising. I came to a little shallow cove and put it in reverse to slow myself down. Well it got stuck again. My brother jumped out and stopped the boat. It was soft dirt on the spot. Well I took the shifter apart again and reset it. I started the motor up had him turn us facing one Lake then we took off after a couple minutes. Well when I put it to about 1/2 throttle the motor starts to bog down now. And will die if I push it further than that. I have new mixed gas in the tank. 50/1. Could the muddy water have clogged something up? I don't know hardly anything about these motors. Thanks in advance for any help given.
