Anybody ever fix a rattling Suzuki four stroke tiller handle?

[FL SNIPER]

Ok...so I have a 3 year old 40 HP 4 stroke Suzuki tiller boat motor. I love the motor...have had no problems with it to speak of...except the handle rattles...and it has gotten more and more annoying to me that I'm now at the point where I want to get it fixed. My friend and I are going to take a look at it in my garage before I give up and bring it into the place I bought it from to have them look at it.

Here's what it does: when I'm in neutral or forward and have the gas on idle (lowest possible gas going to engine) the handle vibrates and rattles if I'm not holding on to it...too noisy...I like to listen to the birds and fish splashing...not my boat motor handle. If I push my handle in the "upright" position or give it a little more gas it greatly lessens the noise...but that is a hastle because I like to keep the motor running while I'm casting and then put it in gear and steer...and well...it's just plain annoying and I want to fix it.

Has anyone run into this problem before? Could it be the boat motor oil I'm using...maybe premium oil would help the vibration in idle? Is it something in the handle itself that is rattling and if secured would stop the rattling? What was the fix if you had this problem and corrected it?

Like I said, my buddy and I are going to do what we can with it...but I figured I'd get some ideas from you guys out there and utilize this great forum resource! Thanks - FL Sniper

[LMITOUT]

Do you have a tension adjustment on that motor? My 90HP Yamaha has one to tighten or loosen the steering and it rides on a semi-circular flat bar which is attached to each side of the engine. This has the same symptoms you describe with vibrating and rattling while trolling at idle speeds. I found a couple of rubber grommets that I inserted between the bolt and the bar mount which took the noise away. Now I can hear how quiet that Yamaha 4-stroke really is.

[FL SNIPER]

Yes...I do have a tension bar...so that is one thing we'll look at...thanks for the tip LMITOUT!

It does seem like the noise is more in the handle part however...in the housing directly behind the throttle.

Any other possibilities?

[clam up]

They say if a guy was to grease the dump out of the innerds on that handle, the rattling may subside for a bit.

[FL SNIPER]

Update: My buddy and I opened up the tiller handle and found out there were a bunch of moving metal parts that were rattling. There wasn't really anything we could do to shore it up...nothing was broke and there wasn't anything to tighten...so my buddy's solution: Grease It! So we lubed everything up real good and it helped quite a bit...not sure how long it will remain quiet...probably have to hit it with grease frequently...but it's a start! Just thought I'd share my current solution.