Does the boat need to be in the water in order to lower the outdrive? I am just making sure that everything is working on this boat before I take it out for the first time this year and I can't get the outdrive to lower. Everything else is working on the throttle just fine.

NO. In my old I/O I could tilt the drive up and down on the trailer. Mine had safety clamps on the arm that you snapped on when towing but you had to remember to take them off otherwise the drive would not come down.

thanks leo. One more thing I need to fix.

My i/o had a differnet set up switches for the tilt vs the trim. The trim switch was on the throttle arm itself and you can use your thumbs. The tilt was down on the base of the housing and was kidna tricky to see. Maybe the tilt only worked in one direction?

yeah, the trailer position button of the tilt only makes it go up. You have to trim it back down.