Outdrive issues please help

"With shifter in gear, either

"With shifter in gear, either forward or reverse, the drive does not seem to engage. I checked all shift cables and have pulled the outdrive for inspection and have yet to find the problem. When manually turning the prop shaft all gears appear to be in working order, but when mounted to the motor there is no drive. Any suggestions?"

"What drive are we talking abo

"What drive are we talking about? What year?

If its an ALpha, try disconnecting the upper shift cable at the eye on the shift bracket; then move the vertical lever that the lower cable is fastened to fully forward and aft. You should be able to engage reverse and forward gears fully doing this.

If not, the lower shift cable is shot, or the lower and upper shift shafts are not engaged correctly.

Rod"

This is a 1986 alpha one drive

This is a 1986 alpha one drive. Everything mates up properly on the outdrive. Only when it is mounted to the boat it does not work. Could this be the engine coupler? What other things should I be checking first? Thanks for your response.

"Hi Doug,
It could be the cou

"Hi Doug,
It could be the coupler. To check it, when you slid the outdrive into the bellhousing the splines should of needed a little twist of the prop shaft. to do this it needed to be in gear. once mated to the coupler, the prop can not be turned if the coupler is not fried and the unit is in gear.

The shifter is connected to cable that moves the lower shift cable connected to the outdrive. this lower cable moves a little lever that is on the lower unit. if off the boat, you move this lower unit lever to fwd/nut/rev and everything works, you should be able to see the lower unit lever move the same way when connected to the boat. My lower cable got water in it and was very sticky and didn't work only when in the water with pressure on the outdrive. I flushed it out with wd-40 and then put light oil(3 in 1) in the cable and the shifting issue was corrected. Hope this helps.
Lief"

"Doug;
Is the water pumping t

"Doug;
Is the water pumping thru the engine when it's running on a hose?
If so, then the coupler and the upper gears and vertical shaft are all working fine, since the water pump is powered by the vertical shaft in the drive.
The problem is in the lower gear case.

With the drive off, can you rotate the lower shift shaft and get solid gear engagement; fwd and rev?
If so, then there is a problem with the upper shift shaft, shift slider, or shift cable on up to the interrupt switch bracket.

I am betting your lower shift cable needs to be replaced. Any idea if this has ever been done? They normally don't last much more than 5-10 years.

Rod"

"Doug, when you took your outd

"Doug, when you took your outdrive apart and reassembled it did you make sure your shifter was in the forward/drive position when you put it back together?"