Re: [OMC-Boats] Evinrude Shifter Lockout

From: Scott Veazie <scottveazie@...>
Date: Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:59:41 -0700

If anyone wants to go to Evinrude's pushbutton style, check this auction. It's cheap and appears to be in good shape. Also, my trained eye for vintage script lettering tells me this is early Evinrude pushbutton, so it would have power applied at the right times. Power forward, none neutral, power reverse. I think they made the change later so if there was some kind of failure, the outboard would default into forward, instead of neutral so you could at least get somewhere with a failed coil. Makes sense, but we need the older style units...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/EVINRUDE-ELECTRIC-CONTROL-UNIT-EXCELLENT-CONDITION_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp3286Q2ec0Q2em14QQhashZitem4a9a216967QQitemZ320413460839QQptZBoatQ5fPartsQ5fAccessoriesQ5fGear

From: Lee.Shuster@...
To: bchowk@...; omc-boats@...
Date: Mon, 24 Aug 2009 16:32:33 -0600
Subject: [OMC-Boats] Evinrude Shifter Lockout

I'll let someone else verify this, as I no longer own an
Evinrude push-button -- But if memory serves, the mechanical lock-out prevents
ANY gearshift button change, once the throttle is advance beyond "start-up" or
about 1/8 or so forward.
 
So you cannot accidently select NEUTRAL (or
REVERSE) when the lock-out slider is properly adjusted and you're just
cruising or WOT down the lake. The E-Rude engineers also designed it fail
safely. IE when the screw becomes loose, you can't shift at all. These always
seems to happen after you are in neutral at the beginning or end of the day?
Weird.
 
IMHO, the Evinrude setup is not intuitive, or necessarily
particularly turn-key or "user-friendly." Remember it came about in 1961-62 when
Chrysler was still using dash-mounted push-button shifters on their
Torque-Flights. (Even conservative Ford, dabbled briefly with pushbuttons in the
late fifties on some of their mid-range products). It is a distinguishing market
feature of E-rudes and in hindsight it is a pretty cool retrospective on
the way things were. And it has the additional benefit of being having a more
robust and reliable physical switch design.
 
lee

From: omc-boats-bounces@...
[mailto:omc-boats-bounces@...] On Behalf Of BC
Howk
Sent: Monday, August 24, 2009 3:09 PM
To:
omc-boats@...
Subject: Re: [OMC-Boats] OMC FACTORY
SHIFTER DIAGNOSTICS

JD,

Lee beat me to the punch on this, but let me expound a
little....You are SORT OF correct about the push button feature for
evinrude's

As Lee astutly pointed out earlier, there is a shot of me
dealing with a "I can't shift into Forward" issue, thus a picture dockside
holding that trusty phillips head un-jamming a little plastic safety slider in
my push button control unit....Ultimately I had a loose screw preventing my
buttons from engaging, let the giggling ensue!!. :-)..

Back to the
plot...on the Evinrude push button there is a slider that moves forward to
physically prevent shifting at anything other than slightly above idle (the
buttons will not physically depress i.e. a mechanical lock out). If you are
running a single pull double throw switch picked up from your local radio shack
or auto store, there NOTHING to stop you from throwing your outdrive accidentaly
into reverse while at Wide open throttle in forward. I shutter to think of
all the nasty things that could happen if your boat tried to go from WOT forward
(30+ mph) to full reverse without slowing to an idle first.......

I
havent ever personally seen or tried to use one of the Johnson versions, but I
can speak to teh Evinrude push button and the weirdness of using one. I had a
hard time with getting used to it mainly because with the push button the lever
is purely throttle...in other words even in reverse, if you want more throttle
you push the lever forward, very strange for those of us who grew up with more
modern controls, i.e. pull back for reverse and push forward for forward with a
little catch in the middle for neutral (is that true of these Johnson controls
too?). On my 69 I'm pretty sure you cannot start in gear (99% sure,
although I always push the Neutral button before starting almost out of
superstition) I think you can always drop it into neutral regardless of throttle
position (and hear the ensuing rev, not 100% sure about that because never tried
it on purpose nor will I, even for science)...I am ABOSULTELY SURE that I cannot
shift from Neutral to Forward or reverse at anything other than idle or slightly
above, I have tried accedentally and am grateful everytime that the OMC guys
built it that way....

I think I'm with Scott on this one, I'd be looking
for a "new used one" from e-bay.

Cheers,
B.C.

On Aug 24, 2009, jd <jdood@...> wrote:

On
  Aug 24, 2009, at 11:47 AM, Lee Shuster wrote:

> Your comment, "Yes
  it's a little weird, but it went ok," probably
> alludes to my
  concerns. You might get away with it under very
> controlled test
  conditions, but it still falls into the "Don't try
> this at home,
  folks!" category.

well, actually it didn't take too much to get used
  to. in reality,
backing away from the dock was a matter of just
  manipulating the
switch and steering. I didn't even touch the big lever.
  perhaps my
idle is set a little high and that's why i was able to do this.
  But
I don't think it's over 1000 rpm. No, my tach isn't working. I
  
know - bad time to not have a functioning tach, but I can hear and
  
feel it shifting pretty smooth and comparable to what it does when the
  
shifter worked. When I was underway, I was always in forward
  
obviously. Slowing down to a stop was a matter of moving the lever
  
back to N, hearing the engine die down, then flipping the switch to
N.
  But yeah, one has to be careful. I don't flip the switch
unless i'm in N
  on the shifter, which sort of "guarantees" the idle
to be down at safe
  level to shift. My idle seems to be a little
sticky which is another issue
  for later though.

And isn't this switching procedure I'm having to do
  with the auto
parts store rigged up switch the same thing the people with
  the push
button shifters have to do? The buttons are the switch,
  right?

>
>
> Yes. Yes. Nothing bad. And anything
  under 1000 RPM, shooting for 475
> to 625 would be ideal.

ok -
  good.

>
> Switch in NEUTRAL: OPEN (OR NO
  CONTINUITY) BETWEEN ANY WIRES/CONTACTS
> Switch in FORWARD: CLOSED (OR
  CONTINUITY) BETWEEN RED and GREEN
> WIRES/CONTACTS
> Switch in
  REVERSE: CLOSED (OR CONTINUITY) BETWEEN RED and BLUE
>
  WIRES/CONTACTS
>
> Logically RED (Purple on later OMC's) is your
  INPUT to the switch
> and you outputs are either (F) GREEN or (R) Blue.
  Make sense?
>
> IS it possible you misread your indications?
  Perhaps confusing the
> FORWARD and NEUTRAL WIRES/CONTACTS?
> Did
  you see a symptom that would not allow you to take the gear case
> out
  of neutral.
>
> Jeff, sometimes I find it helpful to look back at
  the original
> symptom, and document everything I've done so
  far.
> It's not clear from this e-mail what the current outcome of your
  
> testing is. Could you actually successfully engage F and R clutch
  
> coils?

Yep F and R are working fine with the auto parts store
  rigged
switch, so i guess the coils are working. The switch itself is
  
the weird part. It closes in R as it should. Nothing closes in
F. And
  when it centers itself to N, it closes (the tester lights
up). And that's
  all while I'm holding in my hand moving it with my
fingers - not mounted
  in the housing. So for some crazy reason the
switch has failing in a way
  that is making it send power when it's in
neutral position. Grrrrrrrr.
  Wish they didn't melt rubber onto
the whole thing and then rivet it all
  together. Probably could be
fixed otherwise.

Anyway - today's
  mission - I still have the old broken plastic
switch. I'm going to a local
  plastics place and see if they might be
able to take it and mold me a new
  one from it somehow - for $50 or
less. Otherwise I'm stuck doing the Ebay
  thing.

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Received on Monday, 24 August 2009

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