Re: The procedure for swapping control cable ends?
Ok, here's the latest. I took my old cable to a local marine place. The guy told me after looking at my cable that someone replaced the control box with a newer OMC box. That's why the cables were different. He sold me the correct cable with ends. I installed the cable. It was a little better, but I still could not get reverse and forward to both lock with the cable at any adjustment. So, I disconnected the cable, and started to look over the linkage and noticed alot of play in it. So, I disassembled the control linkage joint and levers and saw that the steel was pretty grooved and worn under the nylon bushings. So I cut some brass shim stock and rolled it under the bushings and pushed them onto the different shafts in the linkage after greasing them. This made a huge difference in how tight all the linkage is now. But I still cant quite get reverse and forward with the control cable in any one position. If I cant get this fixed by tomorrow, I am just going to adjust the cable favoring forward, and go to Walmart and buy a trolling motor to acheive reverse. We have company visiting all next week, and the boat will be used quite often. I checked out the control box, everything seems tight, but with the cable attached at the box, I can move the new cable at the engine side about 1/4 inch either way. Is this amount of play in a new cable normal? If so, my last question is this. Since this is not the original control box that came with the engine, is it possible that the newer box doesnt have as much travel as the original box? The reason I ask is, with the cable adjusted perfectly in the middle, I can push the lever further either way and acheive locking at the prop. Has anyone heard of this before? This is my last guess, that the cable travel range of the non-original box isnt as far as the original box. Any thoughts? Thanks.