Help with Outdrive Removal for Bellow Replacement...

[ConnieMarie]

Believe it or not I keep our boat in freshwater(Niagara River) and the boat came from a previous freshwater home. However, I've only had the boat for three seasons now. Upon purchasing the drive/bellows looked good and I never attempted to take the drive off just lubed gimbal each season. Now I know why its so important to take off at the end of each year...won't be making that mistake again.

 

[ConnieMarie]

Well I took the advice and put the drive back on in an attempt to use the rams. I ended up using a ratchet strap to hold the 2x4 on because it kept popping out. Good news it came apart...kind of...bad news I have to replace my upper drive and possibly the pivot housing and the various components of each. The drive would not come out of the yoke housing. The entire yoke housing casement broke off in the pivot housing with the drive still intact. In addition the top of the upper housing where the shaft goes through cracked. There was quite a bit of corrosion throughout. I’m hoping to be able to salvage the shaft all the gears and potentially the pivot housing. Can’t quite figure out how to post the pictures they are too big aparently. Looks like won’t be getting out on the water anytime soon which is a bummer. If anyone has leads on drive parts. I’ve found a couple on eBay looking like about 4K which is goin to hurt quite a bit.

 

[Lou C]

Sorry to hear that, I have been able to make a 30 year old sterndrive last for 15 years in salt water by doing a lot of maintenance, usually removing the drive each year, replacing the exhaust manifolds every 5-7 years, bellows should be done at about 5, there's just a lot to do. And if you neglect it, well it can be bad even in fresh water.
While I was able to keep this one going for little money really since I taught myself to do the work and picked up spares when the parts were starting to get hard to find.

in the words of an old Bahamian boat mechanic
"you can have an in (inboard), an out (outboard) but never an in & out (I/O)! My next boat will for sure be an outboard!

 

[Lou C]

The Cobra uses a gasket between the pivot housing and the upper drive and as long as you coat it well with gasket sealer and the bellows doesn't leak, it comes right off. 20 min job....

I honestly think it would have been a better plan, to haul it off to a good machine shop. I never liked the push it off with the rams technique because those rams can develop more than enough force, to break aluminum. A good machine shop can work wonders.
.

 

[BRICH1260]

Glad you finally got it apart. It sounds like no one ever greased the housings when they put it back together. I`ve found that Ebay is a good source for new and used VP parts.

 

[ConnieMarie]

Yeah there is no way this thing was ever properly lubercated. I have a couple questions regarding new out drive components...first and foremost wouldnt you believe my particular out drive and ratio is close to impossible to find...go figure. Anyways I'm trying to determine difference between the sx-m and sx-c1 they appear to be the same based on pictures. Secondly, I know it's ill advised to stray from the oem ratio on out drive...that being said I have found a decent 1.60 for sale which is as close to my 1.51 I can find. Would this strain the engine that much without a prop change? I don't care about top speed my boat isn't a race boat by my means. Just don't want to lead to future costly engine repairs.

 

[Maclin]

If you can hit top RPM's now then you may need to watch the revs with the 1.6 if you use the same prop. It will be a little peppier out of the hole with the same prop. What size boat is this in?

 

[Lou C]

Volvo may have spec charts where they list what ratios came with what engines, like Merc and OMC did.

for example:

OMC:
3.0 4 cyl: 1.71:1
4.3 V6: 1.68:1
5.0 V8: 1.50
5.7 V8: 1.41
7.5 V8: 1.43

So you can see the bigger the engine, the taller the ratio. What engine, what size boat?

 

[ConnieMarie]

A four Winns horizon 220 with vp 5.0gi v8. I’ve never really floored it to try and max out the rpms. Just kind of slowly get up to a nice cruising speed and maintain. Are you saying I’d have to watch and make sure rpms aren’t too high?

 

[BRICH1260]

If the 1.60 mated up and you watched your max rpm`s, I think you might be ok with that unit on your boat.

 

[Lou C]

What pitch prop do you have on it now?
if your max rpms are over 5,000 then you will need a higher pitch prop. Each inch increase in pitch will lower your max rpm by approx 200 rpm.

 

[ConnieMarie]

Sorry about the delay...The current prop i'm using is Volvo Penta 14 x 3.25 x 19 (PN 3860708). I'd like to find out if I could use a different, possibly newer, vp outdrive. This one I had I guess technically is more of an omc drive maybe briefly manufactured during transitional period to volvo penta. Its close to impossible to find a used 1.51 ratio. Im wondering if there is a compatible sx-a or the sx-c1 drive outthere with same or similar ratio that won't put any unnecessary strain on the engine(Gi 5.0)