Tilt/Trim won't stay up

[LUGGIE]

I have a 99 Johnson 50HP. The power tilt/trim works up and down but it will not stay in the up position. It keeps falling to upright position in about 5 minutes times. Any suggestions.

 

[lexer440]

Re: Tilt/Trim won't stay up

Don't know anything about your motor but I had the same issue some time ago and i found that there is a pressure release that allows the motor to drop without power. On mine it was a large flat head screw, it had been loosened and not retightened so it allowed the motor to drop. After I tightened it it was fine, I know its been said many times by many ppl but.... you can't beat having a manual, well worth the money it costs.

 

[boobie]

Re: Tilt/Trim won't stay up

Make sure your manual release valve is tight. If it is , remove it in the down position and check the orings on it.

 

[ava1]

Re: Tilt/Trim won't stay up

I have had to deal with the same problem this weekend. I have a 2005 50hp 4 stroke yamaha o/b. I recently traded boats and have noticed over the past few weeks that the motor seemed to leak down after a few days and be in the down position after I have been working on it doing maintenance stuff and didn't think to much about it. this weekend we went fishing and i noticed the motor was leaking down very quickly ( i could watch it drift down where as i could not actually see it do that before ). i read all the posts about low fluid hoping that may be it but i knew that was not likely the problem so i called a local shop to varify how to fill it with fluid and get a guestimate for repairs. the mech said it was most likely the check valves in the piston messing up causing the problem and that they have never replaced any check valves just replace the seals. this gave me hope that maybe it was actually something else if this was the first case they have seen. So what i did was 1. run the motor full tilt up and lock the motor stops so the motor would stay up.
2. force as much fluid in the little resevoir as i could get
3. cycle the motor a few times up and down ( it still was doing the same thing )
4. check the manual trim release that it was tight ( it was )
5. loosen the manual release ( counter clock wise ) and let the motor fall and tighten and loosen verying the stopping points
6. after doing this with the manual release a couple of times the trim was workking fine, it stayed up and i could not push it down my hand.
note: i varyed the falling rate of the motor with the manual release screw ( letting it fall fast for a short distance and stop it quickly and doing it slow and visa versa) I thought that it might be a long shot but i thought by doing this that if i had gotten some trash in the check valve ( s ) that maybe by forcing the fluid through the check valves ( by using the manual release ) that maybe it would blow the trash out, it seemed to work, it has been holding in the up position for several days now and i can't still force it down with my hand.

Hope this helps.
AVA1

 

[Coxwain]

Did you add fluid before you tried the up down procedure? Sounds like you bled the air out?

 

[jimmbo]

Did you add fluid before you tried the up down procedure? Sounds like you bled the air out?

Its been 6 yrs since he asked and 5 1/2 since the OP has been on the site. So....