Help... Have been chasing poor idle & starting difficulties since January... Am at my wits end, and this Johnson 235, is about to become a "Davey Jones Locker inhabitant".<br /><br />EVERY SINGLE PIECE (I mean EVERYTHING...right down to the hose clamps !!!) of the fuel system is either FACTORY N.O.S. (new old stock), NEW, or COMPLETELY REBUILT (professionally... not shade tree stuff...)<br /><br />On the hose (in the driveway at home) it runs like there is absolutely NOTHING wrong. AND When it is first dropped into the lake, it starts & idles almost as sweetly as a fuel injected motor. HOWEVER... As the day wears on, the harder it gets to start, and the lower/(and more erratic) the idle speed becomes, until it's idling so slowly/poorly, that WHEN it finally starts, it's hard to keep it running long enough to get it into gear... Here's the weird part... once you're in gear, it will purr and idle/troll for literally HOURS with ZERO problems, until you shut it down, and decide to re-start 5 or 50 minutes later...<br /><br />A few weeks ago, I thought I had it licked, but what was supposed to be a week on Lake Powell, (where the wind was trying to constantly blow me onto the rocks, when it died... GREAT FUN !!!) convinced me otherwise... I finally threw in the towel, and came home WAY earlier than planned...<br /><br />I REALLY need some help on this one, as both myself & my local dealer have spent literally HOURS/DAYS/WEEKS/MONTHS trying to diagnose & fix. For a few hundere more than what I've spent, I could have nearly had a brand-new FICHT... If only I'd known then, what I know now...<br /><br />Is it possible the timing base plate is loose/shifting, causing the erratic idle speeds? Also (and on an errattic basis) it's "sneezing" at idle (which I've been told is a sign of fuel misture being too lean... but I'll be double darned if I can figure out why or how that is occurring...)<br /><br />ALL replys are appreciated... I can't believe I'm the only one who has ever had a "possessed OMC 235" ...
