I noticed before taking her out on her maiden voyage with new engine that the shift shaft was not fully seated and instead of a washer I temp raised the shaft with a 1/8 inch wide rubber hose wiretied to the base of the shaft to raise it. Cruisin and changing rpms for 15 min, reduced power from 3200 to 2500, gave the wheel to the girlfriend(mistake) so I could go in the back to check for leaks etc. Not 10 sec goes by and sounded like it just popped out of gear. Engin revd and ran to shut her down. Tried to put in rev and forw and nothing. So at the time of the popping out of gear or whatever, and after pulling it on the trailer, the shift shaft was making good contact up inside the upper unit slot. Manually,(after removing the hose thing, Shifting feels normal. I could turn the shift shaft because it was lower than the slot. Prop clicks one dir and locks in the other as it is suppose to. Spline out of coupler turns, upper shift slot faces forward ok and No metal in gear oil. If I hold the shift shaft up into the slot and have someone shift it, it all acts normally. Is there a reason(s) why this thing just unloaded? I need help as to how to go about troubleshooting this. New engine, rebuilt upper, original lower.
....JK