Shift Shaft issue

[supersonicf111]

A friend and I were replacing the water pump housing and impeller on his 1998 Mercury 150HP, which went fine. The trouble started when we went to replace the shift shaft seal and the shift staft slid up. At first we got it back in, but it wouldn't shift correctly so we pulled it out again like a couple of fools. Now we can't get it inserted all the way back in the bottom end. We have one of those 3rd part manuals which was helpful with the water pump, but don't have any good information on how to resolve the current issue. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. I'm really hopeing we don't have to pull the prop shaft and carrier to fix this issue. I can provide the serial number of the motor if that helps?

Thanks,

Brett

 

[supersonicf111]

The motor is a 1997 V-150 and the parts the shift shaft connect into are the Follower (89594A1) and Shift Cam (789562).

It looks like all I need to do is to try and get the Shift Cam lined up with the slot in the Follower, and the shaft will slide in properly.

Does anyone know if this is correct?

Unfortunately the unit is at my friends house, so I can test my theory at the moment. Hoping someone with some real-world experience can confirm my thoughts.

Thanks

 

[supersonicf111]

Okay, the crisis has been resolved. I thought I would put our solution in the thread in case someone else makes this unfortunate mistake.

As I thought in my last post. The Shift Cam had slide to the left side (red arrow) of the house when looking from the prop end forward. We put some carpet on the workbench, then laid the housing on it's opposite side (right) looking from the prop forward.

Next we lifted the bottom of the housing up a little, and let if gently fall to on the carpet to get the Shift Cam to slide back into position (green arrow). Then we were able to slide the shaft back in, and it shifts properly now. It took several gentle blows to get the Shift Cam to slide over due to the grease on it and the Follower slot. You could probably achieve the same results with a few gentle raps of a dead-blow hammer on the side of the case.

Morale of the story is to not let the shaft slide upward at all! Otherwise you might not get as lucky as we did and have to pull the prop shaft and carrier out to put the Shift Cam back into place.