I have had a few people tell me to NEVER shift a Bravo when the motor wasn't running? A buddy of mine was cleaning his boat the other day and had kids with him, well, he wasn't watching and his little guy ended up shifting the boat a few times and now he is worried something might be broke. I know last year I was cleaning my boat and I accidently "bumped" mine into reverse without it running and it "SEEMED' to run ok after?

Is there anything we should look for? He is gonna pull the drive to check the U Joints and gimble bearing, so, while the drive is off is there anything we should look for?


Thanks!
Michael

This was only a problem on the early Bravo's. They changed the clutch and gears which allows them to disengage even while not running. It is still not a good idea to shift any outdrive while not running, puts alot of strain on the cables and shift linkages. I had a customer in the 90's that insisted on pulling up to the fuel dock and shutting the engines off while still in gear. He went through cables twice and once the upper drive had to be disassembled to get the gears apart.

If it went into and out of gear easily then everything is fine.

He spoke to his son last nite, apparantly it went into forward easily, but, he had to give it a "hard" yank to get it to go into reverse? SO, if there is anything that we should look for, please let me know [this guys luck is about as good as mine]

Thanks!
Michael

As long as he got back into neutral, it should be fine. there have been plenty of times I have shut off an engine with a drive still in gear. I just put it into neutral with the engine off and never had a problem. If something happens because of it, most likely it was going to happen soon anyway.

I used to throw mine in an out of gear to change props and never had a problem.

When the engine is not running and you try to shift, the cable that goes into the drive can get 'bent' when try to shift. No damage to the drive, but you can bend a cable. Mercury has updated the cables in that area. If the cable is bent he will have 'slow' gear engagement in one direction and not the other.