1999 90 hp Evinrude Ficht dies when put in gear

Dozerlady

Cadet
Joined
Jun 30, 2011
Messages
10
Hi everyone, new boater here,

I hope I'm in the right forum place. Don't beat me up too bad, I'm a woman (LOL) and know nothing about boats, just looking for some friendly ideas. That said, I'm a heavy equipment operator, and I have some mechanical aptitude.

We just bought a 24 ft pontoon boat with a 1999, 90hp, Evinrude/Ficht, 2 stroke/4cyl., with 14 x 13 alum prop. The boat was just taken from storage and dewinterized and tuned up right before we purchased it. I've seen many posts on here about problems with these motors, but none with the same problem, so here goes...

The motor starts and idles ok, but after warming it up for a few minutes, it will die as soon as it's put into gear. I would think after being tuned up it should run ok without dying. The new plugs were pulled and rechecked, one was found to be broken, and the other 3 oil fouled. All 4 were replaced, but it still dies as soon as it's put into gear. After repeated attempts it will finally stay running, but when we do get it moving it will not get over 3500 rpm's, according to the tach. The previous owner claimed it ran fine for him last year. Any ideas what could be wrong?

We have no service records to know if recalls were taken care of or what work was done in the past. We're starting out blind on this. Only other info I can offer is my SIL had to rewire the igniton switch, and replace the depthfinder. None of the dash instruments or radio were working before he fixed the wire on the ignition, but all work since. Also we added a second battery as it only had one. Could he have done something wrong with the igniton that would cause this? Any ideas you guys have would be greatly appreciated.
 

Dozerlady

Cadet
Joined
Jun 30, 2011
Messages
10
Re: 1999 90 hp Evinrude Ficht dies when put in gear

Sorry, forgot to add that the hour meter doesn't work so we have no idea how many hours are on this engine. Also, the screen on the old depth finder appeared to be fried inside, so maybe there was a short somewhere?
 

wilde1j

Vice Admiral
Joined
Apr 15, 2002
Messages
5,964
Re: 1999 90 hp Evinrude Ficht dies when put in gear

A good start would be to get the motor connected to a laptop with dianostic sw. There's lot's of possibiliites, such as injector problem/failure, etc. The software is normally the first step in doping out a running issue.
 

Dozerlady

Cadet
Joined
Jun 30, 2011
Messages
10
Re: 1999 90 hp Evinrude Ficht dies when put in gear

Thanks for the reply Jim,

Yes I've read about that on here, but there is a side issue which is, that this is a shared boat with daughter and son-in-law. But since the dealer tuned it up, shouldn't they have checked that during the tuneup?
 
Top