Mercruiser shifter problem - shifter box

Single lever shifter with gearshift disengage button in center of lower part of lever, power tilt and pwr trim on 3.0 merc. Works fine with shifter disengaged, but when you bring back to neutral, it then won't shift into gear. If I jiggle it around, sideways rather than front/back seems to be better and I can get it into gear. Sprayed some silicon around it and it seems to work a bit better. It's a 2000 model, but has been little used. Any advice - I think it's probably a lubrication issue - but there is only the shifter and the a bezel on the side panel of the boat and the actual shifter box is behind. How to take it apart isn't obvious and I don't have pix in my repair manual - I suspect the shifter arm comes off first and the the cover plate on the bezel - wherein there are probably mounting screws behind the cover. Anyone have a similar problem

 

remove the button by shifting forward with button depressed and take a small screw driver to remove then spray some lube back there works sometimes if not remove control box and you'll see what needs to be lube
first step will be remove handle which is 9/16 nut behind button

 

If I understand correctly - with the throttle forward you just use a little screwdriver to pop the button out of the center.

Thanks

 

yes forward in nuetral

 

Thanks.

Got that working, now if the shop gets around to it this week maybe we can find out why there was 2 qts of water in the oil pan.

 

I have a 2010 Tahoe Q5i with a Mercruiser 4.3 TKS. I was working on another problem and was moving the throttle lever and pushing the throttle only button and to my surprise the button popped out. I put the button back in without problem. But next trip to lake despite moving the shifter it was stuck in neutral and would not shift into gear despite lots of fiddling. I tried remedies in the old thread above of moving throttle forward while pushing button, lubricating, and using a small screwdriver & repeat. My only success was marring the edge with tool marks. Any further suggestions of how to get the button out to see what is going on. I am guessing that when I accidently popped out the button before and then replaced it something went afoul. An exploded diagram would be useful if anyone has one.
Thanks