1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

[kfa4303]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

Hello again 870. I've circled the two lines used as a timing reference in the pic below. The "stop" portion of the twist grip is one way you can kill the motor. It simply retards the timing to such a point that the motor stalls and dies, but you have ot be careful, or you'll keep killing the motor every time you throttle down. You can prevent to motor from dying when you turn the throttle all the way down by adjusting the idle set screw found where the rear tiller gear meets the vertical throttle tower which passes through the lower cowl pan. I don't like it when the motor dies simply by turning the throttle down, so I twist the screw in a few turns to prevent the motor from stalling. To kill my motor I have installed a push-button lanyard kill switch. It only costs about $10, installs in about 5 min., adds an extra layer of safety and works like a charm.

 

[AlTn]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

the 2 marks I'm referring to are on the cam, not the armature plate. Just follow the procedure I posted. In your second pic, the roller is too far past the second mark. The throttle plate should just begin to open as the center of the roller aligns with that second mark. Once you've got this adjusted properly, to start the motor, place the gearshift in neutral, advance the twist grip as far as you can,full choke and pull the starter rope. When it fires, or tries to, go to half choke and start, reduce the throttle to an idle or as much as necessary so it continues to run. The positions on the twist grip serve more as a reference than anything else.

 

[kfa4303]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

Ah, I think these (red arrows) are the marks on the roller cam.

 

[870 Expressmag]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

i havnt had a chance to make the timing adjustments yet, but i am curious about something. I am wondering how the motor sat for a while, and then when i got it, cleaned the carb and had it on the water it ran perfect, then over the course of about 5 trips on the water progressively started getting worse. I dont get it.

 

[kfa4303]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

Well sitting around for years is just about the worse thing for these old motors. It could be any number of things, but the two most likely are failing ignition components, or a dirty fuel system. While the motor might have made it through its maiden voyage, it might also have stirred up debris in the tank/fuel lines that could have clogged the fuel system. If the coils have never been changed then one/both of them is surely bad as well. Thankfully, all of these are easy fixes. Coils, tune up kits (points & condensers) and carb kits only cost about $20 each and you can get them all right here at iboats. It is also possible that the motor overheated during its first trip on the water due to poor, or insufficient water flow, which was in turn due to an old/bad impeller(waterpump). Either way, confirm Compression, Spark and Fuel delivery independently, then try starting the motor.

 

[870 Expressmag]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

already replaced all that stuff and it hasn't helped, been through carb three times and rebuilt with new parts, ignition is good, got fuel, spark and good compression. We can get it to run it just doesn;t run good and wont idle. fuel pump is working, and thermostat and all have been replaced

 

[870 Expressmag]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

AITn, heres what I did, following your procedure. I twisted the throttle until roller was between the two divet marks on roller cam, the roller just barely did not touch the cam but the throttle plate was closed, so i loosened linkage on throttle shaft and held roller tight to cam and tightened back down on throttle shaft. then as i twist the grip the roller has to be going by the second verticle line on the armature plate before the throttle plate starts to crack open, i shift into gear, twist grip to WOT and the roller runs to outsde of roller cam and throttle plate is wide open in throat. is the throttle shaft supposed to start opening when going by second mark on roller cam? or armature plate? if it's supposed to crack open on second mark on roller cam, how do i adjust that? cause it goes well beyond that before it begins to open, like i said it starts opening when just passing the second vertical line on armature plate

 

[AlTn]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

2 marks on timing cam...you must have enough slop in the linkage that you'll have to hold the roller against the timing cam more towards the stop end of the timing cam while taking out the slack in the linkage....just experiment with it so that you end up with the throttle plate beginning to open as the roller passes that second mark on the timing cam....was going to wait to advise you to do a decarbing procedure on the engine, but now may be a good time to do this...look at the beginning of the Forums under the Sticky Top Secret Files...the procedure is described there and after doing this you should have a more tuneable engine, esp. so at idle

 

[870 Expressmag]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

When i adjusted it, i had to hold the roller against the timing cam, but i did so from the piece thats on the throttle shaft, that took the linkage play out of the equation, because if i just held the roller against the cam with my finger and tightened the stop on the throttle shaft the roller would fall away due to a little linkage slop, so i have the slop adjusted out but the throttle doesn;t begin to open way after that second mark, however the roller is making full contact, would the timing cam be worn that much? is it adjustable? also where is that roller supposed to be during normal idle? i am thinking maybe dad and i are turning the throttle back to far when trying to make it idle and it's getting back far enough into the "kill" portion. and what rpm should this idle at?

when i have had the head off a few times and looked inside there at the ports, etc there isn't any carbon hardly to be found. most i found was on top of piston head and it wiped off with rag. this motor hasn't been run to much it doesn;t appear

 

[AlTn]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

idle..throttle plate fully closed, idle circuits take over...rpm..engine hot, in gear,~600 rpm..carbon build up may not be visible until you remove the exhaust cover and baffle...decarb is a preventative thing to keep the rings free and carbon from building up, it's helped the motors I've fooled with to attain a smoother idle

 

[870 Expressmag]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

maybe this will help some, i hope anyways, i brought it out of shop again tonight and put it in water, started it up and fooled with it a bit, wanted you guys to see what it's doing. The first video is after i have been fooling with it and got it warmed up. Only way to keep it running is to keep throttle in start position, now in start position the timing cam plate is all the way advanced as far as it can go in neutral and the throttle plate has not started to open yet. so in the first video it's running in start position. you can see at the end how it just slows down and dies, but then in the second and third video i realzed that the timing cam plate was slowly backing off after a while retarding the spark a little causing it to do funny things, and you can see me reach in and advance the plate back as far as it will go in neutral and kick the throttle plate a little and it will come back, then you see it start doing it's spit and cough stuff. Hope the videos help.
I did turn the screw in on the tiller handle on the port side so that the roller was between the two marks on the timing cam and so it wouldn;t back off to far on the tiller handle and kill it, still no chance of idling, once it starts coming down off the "start" you see what happens
http://youtu.be/IQS4Q-LX7CU
http://youtu.be/b9SbkZQ07Fs
http://youtu.be/KyKWhZuAcj4

 

[AlTn]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

k..couple of things...First. the roller in the carb linkage rest against the Throttle Control Cam < I've been errantly calling it the timing control cam >. If you'll adjust the linkage so that the throttle plate just begins to open as the roller passes the second mark on the Throttle Control Cam then the link and sync part of this is done...Second. As you've found, the Idle Adjustment Screw is on the port side, slightly behind the tiller handle and below the vertical shaft. Screwing it in increases the idle, screwing it out decreases it. It serves more as a stop than anything else.

Idle is set on the water, engine hot, engine in gear pushing the boat. It's difficult to set in a barrel as it's breathing its on fumes. That said, you should be able to adjust out the coughing and sneezing you now have by adjusting the idle mixture needle. If you can't, then maybe one plug has a weaker spark, or the idle and mixture circuits have an air leak or are still partially blocked.

You should reach a point that screwing the idle mixture needle in any further will cause the engine to die and screwing it out any further will cause it to cough. Somewhere between those points will be right.

Try to attain a fairly smooth idle of 800 rpm or so while in neutral as they'll usually drop a couple of hundred rpms when in gear.

 

[870 Expressmag]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

i just talked to a guy that worked at a marina for a lot of years and has lots of experience with these older outboards, i told him all about my troubles and what i have done and the first thing out of his mouth was "are you running your fuel can with the top open one notch?" my answer is obviously no, he thinks thats the problem, it makes sense. I wondered how the tanks vent cause the cap is kinda like a radiator cap with two notches on it when closing it. He says the older evinrude/johnson tanks with steel caps have to be run one notch open to allow the tank to vent, he said thats why my engine progressively started running worse, because as the tank got emptier it couldn;t pull fuel at low idle due to vaccuum in the tank. Does it sound like hes on the right track??

i currently dont have the motor in my possesion, i got so frustrated, i took it to the marina when i picked up my dads sea-ray and they are supposed to check it over, but before they call with their analysis i wanted to see if maybe this tank cap thing had any validity, before i ok them to do some stuff that may be just them getting some hourly work out of me

 

[mini-x fan]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

I'd tell em to try the vent thing first. That could very well be your problem, the fuel tank could be suckin itself and sort of imploding so to speak.

Tight Lines

 

[870 Expressmag]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

well i got to thinking about it and researching a bit, apparently the Johnson tank i have is vented through the fittings for the fuel line? it's a single fuel line double pin johnson tank with metal radiator cap style fuel cap. if i had venting problems i would think it would work the opposite as what is happening, on equipment i work on (landscaping and lawn and garden equip) the faster the motor runs the harder the vaccuum is to suck more fuel the faster they will make a vaccuum in the tank without venting. But they will idle for a long time because the motor is not sucking fuel so hard. But mine runs fine wot but not at idle so i dont think it's the tank, still havn't heard back from marina yet. but as long as we are on the topic, how do you know when the fittings on your hose are worn? i dont get any fuel leakage out of them but the one on the tank when you put it on, pushes it self back off probably a 1/8th to 1/16th of an inch. it locks on ok and doesn;t leak but there is a small gap between line fitting and tank fitting, it's like theres two little fine spring loaded pins pushing against it

 

[nwcove]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

the gap at the tank connection is normal ( i posted awhile back with concerns about that same thing). hard to tell from the vids, but the welch plug on top of the carb doesnt look shiny and new.....was it removed and the ls circuit cleaned? it seems like it has a mild lean sneeze?

 

[870 Expressmag]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

Old welch plugs removed to confirm idle circuit clean, new plugs from rebuild kit installed

 

[nwcove]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

i just did a carb on a 1957 18hp, set the jets to the generic settings, choked it, pulled the cord 5 times and it started. pushed the choke in, and it sneezed so bad it blew about 2 gallons of water out of my 15 gallon bucket....on to the hood and windshield of the wifes car! (quick clean up!)after a few more tries, and ritchening up the ls needle it ran quite well. i know its two different animals, but between the big sneeze and smooth idle, it did stutter like your motor does in the vids.

 

[samo_ott]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

Over the wife's car? That's funny!

 

[nwcove]

Re: 1969 Evinrude Fastwin 18HP troubles

yep....i did clean it fast tho, as she was lurking close by! if i would have known all things i could have moved the car, but the little 5'5's/7.5's i have dont sneeze like that 18! im used to a kachoo.....as compared to that KACHOO!! just glad the car is dark blue and not white.....or id still be trying to explain that lil snafu! lol