Hi, I've pulled my 1993 4hp two stroke mercury outboard off the wall for the first time in a few years. Changed the impeller, head gasket and power house gaskets and thought I was good to go.
But the gear shift into the gearbox didn't seem to be working. I've now stripped the gear box in the lower leg by removing all the oil and pulling the transmission out of the unit (not an easy job).
So I now have the bottom end of the lower leg with the main drive shaft in from the top and a gear shown at at the back of the housing (opposite the prop).
From engine websites such as
the drive shaft meshes with the forward and reverse gears constantly. The pinion gear which drives them is constantly enmeshed so as the pinion gear rotates both forward and reverse gears also rotate.
Since I've removed the gear change lever I would still expect that to be the case, but it isn't, the pinion gear from the drive shaft rotates only by about 1/10th of a rotation enmeshed with the gear wheel at the rear of the housing and I cannot get it to rotate freely.
If I insert the gear change level, nothing changes and nothing appears broken, so what am I doing wrong? Any assistance to help me resolve this and get the gear box working correctly would be greatly appreciated.
Jethrosax
spy-sea-one
