DTS and Broken Shift Cable. All,...

[WickedRx]

DTS and Broken Shift Cable. All, I want to provide an example of a scary and dangerous situation that occurred to me recently. While docking our 2009 350 DA as we routinely do in our slip on Tellico Lake, I bumped the DTS slightly forward to snug the bow to the left and then bumped the DTS into reverse to allow my wife to connect our fixed bow lines we have premeasured and hanging in our slip. We have done this routine many, many times and while docking can always represent a challenge, the weather was cooperative and the boat was nicely in the slip with about 2 feet to go until we were in place. My wife was on the dock holding the dock line when, as I bumped into reverse for that last 2 feet, the boat began going forward. Yes, forward with the DTS shifters both in reverse. I was as confused as I've ever been as my boat sped out of our slip. I paused, shifted into neutral and the boat kept going forward in a left angled arc. I hammered it into reverse and it SPED UP going forward. Ultimately it took about 10 seconds to complete the left arc and smash my anchor into the bow of my dock neighbor (540DA) 3 slips down. My friend who was on the cruise with us tried to push us off, but being under power, he had not chance. I killed the engines and we both pushed it away. I ran down to the cabin, killed the power thinking the electronics in the DTS had gone haywire. Waited as long as I could (we were now drifting toward boats across from us on another dock finger), re-energized everything, turned the keys back on and fired the engines one at a time. The port engine went on and off normally, the starboard engine however took off in forward gear (with the DTS shifters in neutral) upon starting. 

Having figured out I had a STBD engine problem, I used our bow thruster and the port engine to maneuver back into our slip, with my wife doing everything she could with a thrown dock line once we were back close. Turns out our stbd shift cable broke with that last forward bump and the engine remained in forward gear. At which point, my DTS just became DT, so any throttle, reverse or forward would just increase speed.

I've never had a shift cable break nor had a boat start while the gears were engaged, but it is a very confusing and scary/dangerous event. If you find yourself with a runaway boat, just kill the engines. In my case, the fact that the normal manner of slowing/stopping a boat, by shifting into reverse was corrupt really threw me for a loop. My anchor scratched my friends boat and I paid for the gel coat work which turned out fine. I had our boat hauled out and both shift cables replaced.

Back on the water and all is well, but wow, what a harrowing event. Hope this helps in case anyone ever finds themselves in the very odd situation of a boat going forward while in reverse!

[JimP]

You would think shift cables would be a pretty straightforward mechanism, but it is not. There is a cable from the shift lever to the engine, a kill switch interruptor, and a second cable going out to the outboard. They all have to be in synch in order to go from neutral to forward, to reverse. Unfortunately we bought our boat unknowingly with a separated outdrive cable boot (a rubber sleeve covering the outdrive portion of the cable from the transom to the drive). This did two things: effectively put a hole in our boat that was constantly being pumped out, and corroding the cable so that one last forward push of the throttle broke the cable. The engine would run, but the prop wouldn't turn. A tow to the marina and two visits to the repair shop got everything back in order. If your boat is regularly pumping the bilge, check your cable boot. It could save you some aggravation and money. This happened on our 1999 Sea Ray Sundeck 240.

[Tgarris]

Wow I didn’t realize there were cables in a dts, I thought it was all electronic. Ty for sharing

[LaRocheRoma]

The same thing has just happened to us in a deep lock in France. I was making small forward and reverse movements when the  boat suddenly surged forward flat out and the bow jammed in the lock gate with the rising water forcing the stern out of the water. Fortunately we were able to disable the lock and get help. We were lucky not to have been seriously injured/killed but the bow of the boat is badly damaged.