99 200 EFI Shifting Problems

[careybirdwell]

I have a 99 Mercury 200 EFI 0G803451. I have a Quicksilver 3000 Control & Hotfoot throttle. To summarize, I should start by saying I did change out the impellor recently. I performed the check per manual to make sure my linkage was correct by shifting into gear and turning flywheel to watch my prop direction. Everything checked right. I have taken it to the lake 3-4 times with no issues. I fishing a 3 day tournament last week and on the second day, I had a problem of getting out of forward. I messed with it some. I finally got it shifted into reverse but motor was still stuck in forward. After a few try I got everything into neutral. It didn't give me any more issues the next 2 days but I did notice it was harder to push the control into forward gear. I assume it was my cable. Today, I pulled the shift cable off the linkage and it moved very freely. I did notice, I could manual shift into reverse and the prop would engage, put it back into neutral and the prop spin freely, but I couldn't manual shift it into forward enough to make prop engage. Can someone give me an ideal on a starting point to check. I'm thinking I need to drop the lower unit and check my shift shaft but it seems to work fine in neutral & reverse. I also notice that the shift cable retainer was not in the locked position when I took the cowling off. Thanks for any help or advice

[careybirdwell]

I don't know if anyone can tell anything from the postion of my linkage & shift cable

[JOE54]

last gear oil change preformed ????

[careybirdwell]

last gear oil change preformed ????

When I changed out my impellor last month (now it might be worth mentioning there were a few metal shavings in it , but nothing like I found tonight)

[careybirdwell]

Well, i definitely have lower unit issue. I drained the oil to find a lot of metal shavings on the magnet. Once I had the lower unit dropped. I could turn the shift shaft but never get it to engage into forward. I could get the prop to engage in reverse and apin freely in neutral, but nothing in forward. Is this something I might have done when I changed the impeller? I have read some post to say not put your boat into gear without the motor running or spinning the prop. Is that for all outboards or only certain models

I guess my question is, am I looking at a full blown rebuild or do they go in and repair what is needed. What kind of cost am I looking at? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated

[JOE54]

thats why i asked about gear oil ,,, if you didnt force alignment and it installed easily i dout you caused it , every thing in that gearcase must be replaced debri from failure will destroy surfaces of all parts , suggest you replace it with reman

[careybirdwell]

Thanks Joe