Honda tiller, electric trim problem

[G.J.]

I have an 05 Honda tiller with electric trim. The down trim is going on and staying on as soon as the key is in the on position. Curious if anyone has had the same problem or if anyone has any thoughts on the fix?

[marine_man]

Do you have a test light? I'd find where the trim motor connects to the main engine harness and disconnect it. See if you can figure out if the problem is in the motor, or a short to power in the wire harness first. In it's most simplest form, what you have is either a stuck trim relay or a short to power on one of the wires running to the motor.

marine_an

[G.J.]

Thanks for the reply marine man. Found the problem yesterday and it turned out to be a very easy no cost fix. The boat has 3 trim options. 2 on the tiller motor and 1 on the floor. The two on the motor worked fine without the key on as they should. The floor only works with key on so I took that apart and found the problem. The floor control has a rubber button with a metal cap attached to the inside of the top that closes the circuit when you step on it. Somehow that metal cap pulled away from the top of the inside of the button so it was constantly keeping the circuit closed. Just needed to push the metal cap back into the top inside of the rubber button and problem solved. I had a lot of gear in the boat packed for vacation and I think something shifted and put enough sideways pressure on the button to pop that metal piece out of place. Eventhough it turned out to be a 10 minute fix I'm sure I spent more than an hour following wires, pushing buttons before I decided to take the foot control apart.

[marine_man]

Glad you figured it out!

marine_man