1994 Mercury 200 HP idles ok, but can't increase power.

[rfav21]

Hi to all,
I've got a '94 Mercury 200 hp I'm having a problem with. The engine seems to be fine at idle, about 1000 rpm, even while running at idle through the no wake zone coming out of the marina. As soon as I try to speed up the engine bogs down and won't run any faster. Also there is a good amount of vibration and the engine sputters a bit. Previous to this symptom the engine had been running good. Any help or advice is appreciated.

[TEXAS20225]

carb or efi ?? lots of things could cause this problem . stator, dirty carbs

[rfav21]

Hi Texas,
The engine is carburated. I changed the in line fuel filter today. Also the plugs for the heck of it. The engine ran fine going out last week, we made a few moves and then the problem came up. When I started the engine it was revving in neutral, I pushed the button on the control and accelerated the engine a bit, put it back in neutral, this slowed the rpm's to where I could put the engine into forward, we were ok for that move, but after that we couldn't get the same response after starting again.
rfav21

[cig 21]

did you ever figure out what was wrong

[ssmith007]

Could an air leak cause high idle? Maybe link-n-sync? I'm no expert but there r plenty on here that are. I wouldn't run it until u get it looked at. Good luck. Smitty

[rfav21]

Cig, Still haven't figured this out. Kinda still waiting on ideas. A mechanic at the marina checked it for a bit, but had no luck. He suggests taking it to my normal mechanic.Smitty,I'm not sure I know what you mean by air leak. Do you mean like a vacuum line. I keep thinking along the lines of something electrical, you know, switchbox, stator, diode. Thanks for the help guys, if anyone else has anything I can try its appreciated.

[rfav21]

An update. My mechanic is checking it out. He took it for a water test after trying a few things. While on the water he tried adjusting the timing and couldn't get it to run right. While water testing he was using his own portable tank with a premix. I probably should have mentioned that my vro has been disabled and I run premix. While out on the water he noticed the carbs had a bunch of condensation building up. So, he is now looking to remove the carbs to have a look at them and clean everything up. We'll see where this takes us, hopefully thats all it is. I'll post an update after trying this out.

Rfav21

[cig 21]

send them to cris carson have him do them and send intake and reed cages to be done

[rfav21]

I talked to my mechanic today and when he removed the carbs he checked the reed valves and said they look good. He did find a defective idle stabilizer which is on order, also found the carbs way out of adjustment. Once the stabilizer is installed I'm hoping we'll be good to go. I'll post an update after water test.

[coffeeguy]

Today I was chasing another problem and I changed switchboxes. The boat idle ok (on the hose) but seemed to be about 100 rpm higher then the ones I replaced. Went out to the lake and the motor wouldn't go over 1200 rpm just bogged out. Switched the old one back in a no problem. I am going to look up how to test switch boxes tonight.

[perfmarine1]

Just run without idle stabilizer,they have too many problems.

[rfav21]

A quick update. After my mechanic cleaned and adjusted the carbs, replace the fuel line and primer bulb, changed the idle stabilizer, my outboard is running great!!! I had already ordered the stabilizer so I had him put it in anyway, but so far so good. New problem though, she's running a little hotter than I'd like, so I think I'll change the t-stats just to eliminate them, hopefully that does it.