Quote:
Originally Posted by JeremyD
I've aligned a couple of inboards - there are some cheat sheets out there that you can use - I ended up doing the last one by feel and it turned out pretty well. I will tell you that it took some maneuvering to move a 1,100 lb diesel engine.
Also know that the normal shaft logs are designed to have a slow drip to cool them. Tightening the packing down all the way will cause them to score the shafts and then they will really leak. You can buy dripless logs that are not too expensive, While you are in there - double up those hose clamps
My dripless shaft logs
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I watched a couple YT videos on it that made it seem like rocket science with the guy using a .0015" feeler gauge to check the two face surfaces. I understand the importance of it being dead nuts on to not cause vibration, so I did as you did with feel. I did use a .004" feeler gauge and got it consistent all the way around the flanges and centered where it exited the hull. Use a slit piece of rubber hose to center the shaft at the hull before starting the motor adjustment. The motor adjustment was tedious to be sure and getting a second set of eyes and hands helped significantly in sighting and adjusting with each of us working a side.
The boat being nearly 40 years old the motor mounts are in need of replacement, so I took that into consideration for this effort. The existing sealing/packing rope was pretty much toast resembling a used up shoelace to the point the coupler simple spun off after the safety wire was removed. Aligned it, replaced the coupler packing and will hopefully get it into the water later this week for a test. The plan for this winter is to replace the motor mounts, repack the rudder shaft (add a zirk for greasing as well), replace the prop strut bushings. Will possibly look into another style shaft log at that time, but if the rope packing works why mess with what's working? Ya, they are designed to drop for cooling as you mention, but only 6-7 drops a minute is a win.
What puzzles me is as off as the shaft was prior to separating the output & prop shaft flanges why was that not causing vibration when the realign require such rocket science precision? I was not gunna skip aligning it as best as I could but am still having a hard time wrapping my head around that.
This site is golden and has been very, very helpful in getting some confidence and info on doing these tasks. Much like pelican did for me with the 911 20+ years ago.
https://www.youtube.com/@rontanis1024