cable steer tension

[crestlining4muskies]

Surprisingly I haven't found anything helpful out there for my extremely loose steering so far. I have a 1750 crestliner fish hawk with a 90 hp 4 stroke mercury. After talking to the merc folks, I found out that unlike the 40, 50 and 60 hp, the 75, 90 and 115 do not have any steering tension adjustment screws on the motor. Merc said that the single cable steering mechanism on the boat should have it's own steering tension adjustment on the back side of the steering wheel. Well, either I'm real stupid, or my 1750 doesn't seem to have anything to tighten as he said it should. Any tips out there from crestliner owners...or maybe all these cable steer steering wheel assemblies are the same? Right now it's so loose that any speed the motor kinks fully to the right or left (mostly right) very quickly, and of course it flops about while trailering too...though that is much less serious than the kinking motor if my hand slips off the wheel at speed! Friend was tossed from the boat at 40 mph once actually....

 

[Chris1956]

Re: cable steer tension

Notmally the steering gear is all made by teleflex and one or two other companies. I never saw a tensioner on any rack and pinon steering set up.

You can buy an "no-feed-back" steering setup from any Marine Accessories store and install it. You can also adjust the zinc anode on the Merc to make the motor track straight at most planing speeds.

I have cheapo R&P steering(non NFB) on my 16 footer with a 135HPV6 merc, and have no issue with loose steering. Ditto on my 21 footer with a Johnny 150HPV6. I am not sure why you are having a problem.

 

[crestlining4muskies]

Re: cable steer tension

thanks for the reply...yeah mine is a teleflex like you thought. Not sure why this one is so dang loose. Actually loose is an understatement - more like zero resistance would be closer to what I'm experiencing. Went out trolling with my 5 year old son this past weekend, had a nice hookup, instinctively grabbed for the rod - immediately the motor kinked all the way to right within about a half second and we both hit the deck! Thank God we weren't near the gunwhale. Man I need some help here!!! Crestliner called me back, but no good input yet. thanks again.

 

[crestlining4muskies]

Re: cable steer tension

Just a quick update since talking to a few fishing buddies it seems like a few others have the same issue. Crestliner called and confirmed that installing a NFB helm is probably the best option. Sounds like a $150 fix. Shocking to me that there isn't some cheaper, simple solution. I think I'm going to try to make a small 'tensioner' that would permanently affix to the sheath on the motor that houses that greased slide bar (I'm sure these are the proper technical terms!), then snug the other end of the makeshift tensioner with a cable tie just to see if that can add some resistance. Seems like even a small piece of hose could work...also I'll keep searching online to see if someone sells a <$20 tensioner that would accomplish the same thing. My buddy's aren't willing to experiment too much with it, so I guess I'll be the guinea pig!

 

[blindsquirrel?]

was your fix successful? Have a 1650 Fishhawk with same issue

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