New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Yip, I did. To me it seems like the neutral position of the control lever isn't in the correct place, or more likely the upper shift cable needs to be adjusted so that the amount of forward gear pull is reduced and the amount of reverse gear push is increased on the cable (or visa versa, I forget which way it operates without looking at it), and thereby altering the position that neutral found. Am I on the right path?

 

[achris]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Sounds like a place to start....

 

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Ok, so this may sound like a dumb question but what would be the best thing to adjust first in this scenario; the brass barrel of the upper cable, brass barrel of the lower cable, or?

Cheers

 

[achris]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Have you watched my video? If so, you have already been told that once the 6" is set on the lower cable you do not change it. END OF STORY!! If you need to adjust one of the cables it MUST be the remote control cable, not the lower shift cable....

Chris........

 

[jaa241]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Also not sure if anyone mentioned the arm that both the remote control cable and shift cable attach too, but on that arm, there is a slotted bolt for the lower shift cable. That is used for adjustment of reverse. You need to take off that arm and file out the slotted hole to add more throw in the cable for the lower shift cable. I had the same issue and I slotted it about another 1/4 inch or so. This should make up the difference of any slop in your gears and stretch in the remote cable.

 

[achris]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Also not sure if anyone mentioned the arm that both the remote control cable and shift cable attach too, but on that arm, there is a slotted bolt for the lower shift cable. That is used for adjustment of reverse. You need to take off that arm and file out the slotted hole to add more throw in the cable for the lower shift cable. I had the same issue and I slotted it about another 1/4 inch or so. This should make up the difference of any slop in your gears and stretch in the remote cable.

That's explained at length in my video....

Shift cable adjustment

 

[jaa241]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Wish I would have saw that video before. Great video by the way! If you follow the video there is no way you could not get your boat adjusted properly. well done!

 

[dubs283]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Ok, so this may sound like a dumb question but what would be the best thing to adjust first in this scenario; the brass barrel of the upper cable, brass barrel of the lower cable

you do not need to change the length of the lower shift cable, once its set at 6" in fwd gear, less four turns its done, you no longer adjust it

if you have reached the limit of the upwards travel of the slot for reverse gear and you are still having issues you now need to adjust the remote shift cable

do not grind the slot bigger, the remote cable probably has slop in it and if you still have fwd - neu issues after all adjustments fail to alleviate the issue you may need to replace the remote shift cable

 

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Also not sure if anyone mentioned the arm that both the remote control cable and shift cable attach too, but on that arm, there is a slotted bolt for the lower shift cable. That is used for adjustment of reverse. You need to take off that arm and file out the slotted hole to add more throw in the cable for the lower shift cable. I had the same issue and I slotted it about another 1/4 inch or so. This should make up the difference of any slop in your gears and stretch in the remote cable.

Thanks for that. It's not so much the lack of reverse select that I'm having trouble with, although I have had to shift the stud half way along the slot to get it to engage, but rather getting the drive to disengage from forward. Did you end up having to adjust the brass barrel on the remote cable to get the forward:neutral to operate correctly and then found you didn't have enough adjustment left in the slot for reverse?

Cheers

 

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Thanks for all the advice guys. When I'm next at the boat I will once again start from scratch, go through and double check all adjustments, and then play around with the remote cable adjustment. I'm getting the feeling that cable replacement may be on the cards? On that note, are remote cables a Mercruiser p/n or would I source one from a non marine specific manufacturer such as Teleflex, etc?

 

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Ok, I think I'm chasing myself around in circles now with this one? This morning I went through all cable adjustments and set them to recommended spec. Drive wouldn't reliably come out of forward, although I did observe that it would come out of gear on occasion if I swiftly moved the remote into neutral position, whereas if I shifted it at a slower, more normal rate it would not. Also observed was that the shift cut out switch mechanism didnt always move the same amount every time neutral was selected. Manually flicking the shift lever would shift it out of gear, whilst flicking the shift cutout switch sometimes would bring it out of gear; sometimes wouldn't.
I then tried different positions of the reverse stud, as well as increasing the number of turns out of he brass barrel of he remote cable up to a total of nine turns, and although these adjustments did change the way that the gears shifted I still could not get neutral to select reliably.

At this stage I've run out of ideas so a new remote cable will be my next move, unless someone can suggest a different avenue?

Cheers

 

[ktbarrentine]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

1. Are you doing this testing in the water, or out? (affects the operation of the shift interrupt)
2. Shifts are supposed to be "swift". What is your definition of "more normal rate"?
That's it...I'm out of ideas.

 

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Yes, tests done in water. As far as shift speed, well I guess that's a little difficult to describe, but i certainly wouldn't describe my normal shifting as slow. Smooth and steady perhaps

 

[dubs283]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

merc does make a shift assist, its a spring loaded arm that attaches on the remote cable side of the shift plate - it allows for a better neutral egagement

 

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

merc does make a shift assist, its a spring loaded arm that attaches on the remote cable side of the shift plate - it allows for a better neutral egagement

Is that an aftermarket add-on, as opposed to the interrupt micro switch arrangement that I currently have?

 

[Don S]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

It's not an add on, and you don't have a place to install it on your shift plate.

 

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

UPDATE:
Today was the first opportunity I've had to take te boat out on the water since I replaced the remote shift cable. I was hoping that this would solve the issues I have with the drive not coming out of gear, but it hasn't.
When I fitted the new cable and with with everything set back to standard as per the manual I straight away found that I still needed to move the adjustable stud to half way along the slot in order for reverse to engage. In the water the drive will shift into forward and reverse happily but still wouldn't come out of forward gear without pulling the remote lever back past the neutral position slightly. Selecting neutral from reverse gear did seem to be better but still not ok.
I felt that the idle was a little fast so I slowed that down until the engine was just ticking over without stumbling - unfortunately I don't have any reliable means of checking the RPM but I guesstimate it to be about 600-700rpm? This helped a bit but still not 100%.
Going against the manual I decided to try unscrewing the adjustable barrel on the remote cable a further two whole turns (now six turns out), and this did improve the situation but still not as good as the old MC1 drive that I removed.

I did observe that the shift cutout lever moved very little when shifting forward to neutral, if at all, whereas when shifting reverse to neutral the lever could be seen to give a positive jump and as a result would come out of gear more reliably. What would be causing this?

I've run out of ideas on this now, so again I turn to the forum of experience with the hope that someone may be able to suggest a different line of attack? What really troubles me is that the old MC1 drive Used to shift flawlessly but the new SEI seems to have bought on this problem. SEI assure me that it is just a matter of cable adjustment, but I'm starting to wonder whether there could be a drive issue?
I'm just weary that if I get a marine mechanic to look at they will just do exactly what I have been trying and achieve the same outcome?

Cheers

 

[Cresco750]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

I think my next move will be to pull the SEI drive off and reinstall the original MC1, that way i may at least be able to isolate whether its a drive issue or a shift linkage issue? Any thoughts at all before I start turning spanners? The lack of movement of the cut out lever puzzles me still.

Cheers

 

[kencat]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

Hey Cresco750,

Any more updates on the saga?

I have a crooked intermediate shaft as well on a new SE106, and I'm wondering if this is an indication of issues inside the drive. Would like to know if your old lower gearcase works ok as it did before, on the SEI upper.

Cheers,

kencat

 

[liquidlew]

Re: New SEI 106 outdrive; occasional difficulty coming out of gear.

I hate to be a party pooper, but I'm having my doubts about SEI stuff. I just bought 2 new SEI trim cylinders and when I installed them, one was fine, the other leaked out of the top rear fitting. SEI does have a good no fault warranty. so they sent me a replacement. But guess what, the new one also leaked at the same fitting, even after I put a brand new hose on it! I notice these are made in China, and I had trouble with some GLM (Chinese) maifolds 4 years ago. Sorry SEI, I'm sticking with MERC from now on!