Atomic 4 clutch

Q

Quiet Magic

Member II
I was coming into the harbor this evening after a great afternoon of sailing but for some reason the shifter on our atomic 4 will not engage all of the way there by reducing speed and head way :esad: . Can any one point out he problem and is this a common problem with atomic 4s? The engine is a 1978.
MY dad thinks its slipping, if it is how can it be fixed? :confused:

Thanks for any help.​
 
E

Emerald

Moderator
First thing I would check is that the cable is not slipping. Remember that slipping includes movement of the housing as well as the actual cable slipping at it's attatchment point. Also, be sure to check both ends of the critter. I've had mine loosen up at the binnacle side before.

Does the shift lever feel normal in pressure as well as amount of travel? If you loosen up the cable at the transmission side, you should be able to grab the shift lever on the transmission and it should have a very positive feel of going "clunk" when you shift it into the forward gear.

Another thing to be sure of is that the bracket that holds the cable at the transmission side is solid, and not rotten to the point that it has bent or is bending under the load of shifting it into gear (had to make a new one for my A4 powered E-27 - rusted severly at the aft most part).

If all the above is OK, then you might see if you can put it into gear and hold the flange on the back of the transmission (do not put vice grips on your prop shaft! If you score it, you can cause it to crack later, very bad news e.g. sink your boat if you loose the shaft out the shaft log), and while holding the output, try turning the flywheel on the front of the engine. This is of course easy if you have the hand crank, and hard if you don't....

Other things, but I am assuming you've had a sudden change in performance, would be a prop that is severly fouled, or in the case of a folding prop, one that is not opening for some reason. Do you have vibration as well?


Hope these thoughts get you going in the right direction.


-David
Independence 31
Emerald

and E-27 Avanti (for sale, if anyone is interested, contact me directly)
 
H

HGSail

Member III
Yes go to Moyer marine. Don Moyer is the Guru of the A4, If anyone can answer your question it will be Don.

Pqat
E29
#224
Holy Guacamole
 
J

Joe Benedict

Member II
I agree Moyer marine is the source. I was having the opposite problem and it turned out that the clutch had been overtightened. If you have the direct drive version and, it isn't the linkage, the process is really simple as described in the postings (with pictures) on the website - sometimes listing under "reversing gear". A few suggestions - if the engine number is less than 200,000 and you havn't run long with a slipping clutch - try tightening the adjusting collar only one notch - the gear cluster is the assembly with the three fingers coming off going aft - you rotate this by hand with the engine off and transmission in neutral until the retaining bolt is visible - the adjusting collar turns very easily by hand within the gear cluster when the bolt is removed - MARK WHERE THE BOLT WAS BEFORE YOU START MOVING THE COLLAR AROUND - the directions to turn things clockwise or counter clockwise are as if you are looking at the rear of the engine. With a cold engine it shouldn't take an hour and you need a half inch wrench and socket to take the cover off and a half inch socket for the retaining bolt. If you adjust the reversing gear while you're in there, try only one click first - I think it took a 5/8ths wrench.
 
Q

Quiet Magic

Member II
loose collar

It turned out to be somthing as simple as the adjusting collar not being tight enough in the foward gear and the reversing gear was to tight because of that the engine could never go into full forward and when shifting from forward to reverse the clutch skipped right over neutral. Thanks for the suggestions, the Moyer Marine website as well as the mannuel we have from them was a big help (actually we would have never figured it out with out them).
All is good in the land of my boat. :egrin:
 
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