Stiff transmission shifter

[Navman]

The shift lever at the pedestal is getting to be nearly impossible to put into and take out of gear Without much effort. I have greased the shift lever coming off of the engine but it is binding up again after only a short period. Any ideas?
Thanks in advance!

 

[bigd14]

How old is the shift cable? That would be my chief suspect.

 

[JSM]

Disconnect the cable from the shift arm. If the arm shifts freely by hand its probably the cable.

 

[Christian Williams]

Cable replacement:

Yacht Specialties Pedestal Disassembly, with Photos [Master Thread]

(Yacht Specialties/Merriman binnacle steering manual: https://ericsonyachts.org/ie/resources/merriman-binnacle-catalog.187/ ) ( Edson pedestals: https://backwinded.wordpress.com/2015/12/07/replacing-the-diesel-engines-throttle-shift-and-stop-cables/ also Edson 335 pedestal with Yanmar 3YM30...

ericsonyachts.org

 

[Navman]

The cable age is unknown. I’ve had the boat for 10 years now. Sounds like she’s getting a new cable. Any tips on replacement? I have noticed in the past that the cable was xtra long and had to be coiled. Is that normal?

 

[Frank Langer]

The cable age is unknown. I’ve had the boat for 10 years now. Sounds like she’s getting a new cable. Any tips on replacement? I have noticed in the past that the cable was xtra long and had to be coiled. Is that normal?

Most experts suggest that the cables be replaced every 5 years, so you may be overdue.
On our boat the cables were not coiled, and did route to their connections, but I was still able to reroute them to shorten the cables by about a foot or more, with less bends, which increase friction. It's worth a bit of thought to get the best route.
Frank

 

[Christian Williams]

Coiled 360 degrees? Sloppy, at least. I don't know why people order cables without measuring.

 

[Pete the Cat]

I just had an interesting case helping a friend with cable replacement. Most cables are made by Morse and yard folks call them by their brand name Morse cables. The perplexing thing is that we replaced the guy's cable with a shorter one (we all thought "he doesn't need that stinkin loop in there!" and the thing would not shift. Turns out some of these loops can be necessary to ease shifting because of geometry or construction of the boat angles to the transmission. I cannot imagine a 360 degree loop is right and seems like it would cause problems. Generally the guys at the yard just send the cable to the Morse supplier and get a replacement made up, but maybe you could get a picture of the route of a sister ship and see if your routing is standard. Also, it could be. that someone has put a restrictor clamp on the cable (sometimes they are necessary to keep the cable from moving too easily--mostly on throttle cables). The clamp would be obvious and generally on the cable at the base of the pedestal--and that solution would be easy. But nothing is ever easy on boats.