1971 Mercury 650 - Controls issue

[USAFitz]

Hey everyone. It's been a while but it's nice to be back.

The great thing is that she is sounding great! Purrs like a kitten. Unfortunately, i am having some problems with the controls. When i shift to forward or reverse gear, the cam inside of the control box pops out of place. Interestingly enough, there's no wiggle room in there and everthings tight. So that's not it. After opening it up, i see that at Top Dead Center (TDC) where the cam connects to the shift side lever, there's a notch where the middle cam slides right in. When i shift to forwrd or reverse, the cam comes out of that notch. I'm pretty sure that when i shift back to neutral, it's supposed to slip right back into that notch, but it doesn't and the controls get stuck.

If anyone's familiar with these old control boxes, please let me know and i'll take some pics. Thanks for the help!

 

[ThumbPkr]

Re: 1971 Mercury 650 - Controls issue

I have mine apart but I am not looking at it right now.I do remember having to tighten that cam up as it was loose.If you take it apart enough to see the back side of it you will see what you have to do to tighten it.Ron G

 

[USAFitz]

Thanks For replying. I have it apart and here's what i'm looking at. The first thing i notice when comparing the manual to the parts is that i am missing whats called the 'cam follower' (#23). You can see on the shift lever (#36) that there's a notch on the top of that center gap. The face cam (#22 big round center piece) fits into that notch when put together.

What is happening is when i shift into gear, the notch on the face cam goes so far to the right or left that ot slides out of that notch on the shift lever. When it does, it rests on that side and i can't get it back into the notch. So i'm thinking that the cam follower has something to do with guiding the face cam back into the notch.

What do you think? And do you know of any good places where i can find the spare parts?

Thanks again for your help.

 

[ThumbPkr]

Re: 1971 Mercury 650 - Controls issue

Looking at my manual I seem to remember that item# 7 and 8 to be what was loose on mine but no matter,the fix would be the same by the looks of it.My box is white like yours is but it might be that the next version which was black could be the same inside,my manual only shows the white one.
I would think that an old dealer might have what you need and this is not to say that you can't order the parts or in worse case make them.I would be watching ebay as this stuff comes up often.Craigslist might yield a hit too if you have the time to wait.Ron G

 

[carholme]

Re: 1971 Mercury 650 - Controls issue

Fitz;
While you have the box apart, look on the inside of the case halves and see if the stamped P/N is 45880. If so, there are rollers available.

If it does have that P/N, here is a link to the parts listing:

http://www.crowleymarine.com/mercury-outboard/parts/640_28.cfm

Gerry

 

[chum1]

Re: 1971 Mercury 650 - Controls issue

From what i can see from your pics there is no roller? #7 and #8 from carholmes schematic, this roller rides in the slot on the big round part and guides the parts to mesh correctly, also there is a little roller that falls out and easily lost for the neutral spring detent which may be missing, this gives you a positive neutral when moving the handle.

I had to strip back the wires on mine on the harness and resolder one at a time to the key and choke switch. I found fresh, clean and new looking wires to work with under the sheath and they even had the correct colors to the schematic it was time consuming and kind of a can of worms but needed to be done to eliminate future problems.

 

[Gibbles]

Re: 1971 Mercury 650 - Controls issue

Your control box looks just like mine inside.

Part listings...
http://www.boats.net/parts/search/M...REMOTE CONTROL ASSEMBLY (ELECTRIC)/parts.html

 

[USAFitz]

Holy cow, Gibbles! That was perfect. Thank you for posting that. I think what i'm going to do is take a chance and get some of the main parts for my control box and hope that it was the warn out pieces that are causing the problems. I have the originals from 40 years ago in there, so it's worth replacing anyway. I'll post again when i get the parts and let you all know how it works. Thanks for all the posts!