Utopia Throttle Lever Lube or Adjustment

[Squidoo]

I did quite a bit of searching with no luck. My throttle lever has a couple of catches in the action, it is extremely difficult to get a skier up. Right at the point the skier is almost up is the point of transition from just moving the reversers, to beginning to open the throttles. The skier starts coming up, then there is a slight reduction in speed, the skier drops slightly, then the throttles start opening and the rope gets yanked out of their hands, almost every time.

Today I disconnected the cable at the reversers. While the lever is much easier to move, the catches still occur at the same point. That makes me think that there is something that needs lubricating or adjusting in the lever itself.

I removed the lever and the beauty covers for the base. Under the covers are four large Phillips-heads that must mount everything to the boat. I did not remove the screws because it looks like that will just allow the inner workings and cable(s) to fall inside the boat.

Am I barking up the wrong tree? Or if I remove those screws, will the throttle lever assembly guts magically become accessible?

 

[Squidoo]

Nobody has had the assembly off? Come on, guys, summer is short. Help me get this right.

 

[Phildoo]

Had my speedster torn apart the other day, sounds like the same setup, The whole assembly will lift right out, not gonna drop.

 

[Squidoo]

Thanks. I'll sharpen my Phillips and get to work.

 

[Squidoo]

When it fell into the hull, i didn't lose it, it couldn't go too low because of the cables and speaker. The assembly won't come out of the mounting hole, it is larger than the hole. It turns out that removing the speaker gives perfect access.

I lubed and greased everything but it still is catchy.

To try and solve the skiing problem, I adjusted the cable that operates the throttle at the lever, so that the lever begins operating the throttle before the reverse gates are fully up.

I'm taking the boat out tomorrow, I'll report back if anybody tries skiing.

 

[Squidoo]

Well that was a mistake. Adjusting that cable made for some goofy low-speed control. I'll put it back where I found it and try to rethink my problem.