Johnson and evinrude outboards

wabbit1211

Recruit
Joined
Apr 17, 2010
Messages
2
I have 3 outboards all with the same problem. An evinrude 115 hp I think it is a late 70's model maybe early 80's And A 115 Johnson and 140 hp johnson All Are about the same age but not sure of year models on any of them. All have the same Carbs elegtronics are all close to the same, Very little differences in any of them. The problem is none will Idle, and only will start by moving the throttle forward. they all die when you move the throttle back to idle position, or when you try to put them in gear. All plugs are new and all are firing, I have disassembled all the carbs, cleaned all parts and reassembled them. I was an automechanic for years but boats just seem to throw you for a loop. I have read every post remotely pretaining to this and tryed to adjust them every way I can see to adjust them, but I'm bound to be doing something wrong. Compression on all three engines are all almost exactly equal( about 95 lbs) buy my gage, all gages I know can vary but I used the same one for all. If you can get any one of them into gear and give them throttle, they will all reveup and seem to run fine, plenty of power and no misses, but if you bring them back to idle or to neutral they will die. All will restart as long as you move the throttle up past an idle with no problem. What exactly adjust the idle? IS it the screw with the rubber stop ont the arm on the side of the motor or do you do it with the cable? What can I be missing since I can't get anyone of the the motors to idle. I'm at witts end someone please tell me how to adjust the idle, pictures of what to adjust would be helpful. Could timeing be off on all three, seems odd that it would happen to all three. All have fresh properly mixed fuel too and all screens cleaned no fuel leaks. All help will be greatly apreciated. Thanks Harold
 

emdsapmgr

Supreme Mariner
Joined
Dec 9, 2005
Messages
11,551
Re: Johnson and evinrude outboards

Idle rpm's is set by the idle timing-that screw on the side of the engine. If the idle is set too low, it won't idle in gear. That idle screw should be adjusted so that the engine runs at 650-750 rpm when in gear, idling at normal level in the water at the dock. It may idle around 900 to 950 in neutral. (You can't set it on the trailer.) At idle the carb butterflys are closed. The fuel goes thru special passages in the upper carb body to feed the engine at that point. These are very small passages and tend to clog up with dried fuel over the years-esp if the engine was stored for a long period of time. You can open these idle circuits (passages) with some aerosol carb cleaner. Compare how the cleaner flows from one passage to the same passage in the other carb body.
 

wabbit1211

Recruit
Joined
Apr 17, 2010
Messages
2
Re: Johnson and evinrude outboards

Thanks for your responce That was what I thought but wasn't working, But I did find the problem on the one engine, someone had the coils wire to the wrong terminals acording to the diagram. I switched them to the right place and was able to get it too Idle. I will check the same on the other two engines , I doubt I could be so lucky the others are wired wrong too, but they do have the same symptoms.Just couldn't imagine a four cylinder running that good at full throttle with two cylinders fireing at the wrong time. Thanks for your help, Im new at posting so I hope I did it right and in the right place. What a great cite this is, I stumbled onto it googleing my problem. I will check out the online store or parts and try to support the site when I need parts in the future.
 
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