Have saildrives improved?

[lindabarzini]

I read a bunch of old posts (6-8 years old) about how potentially bad saildrives are versus the traditional prop shaft. Have saildrives improved?

On my first boat, I started taking on water in the middle of Chesapeake Bay because my packing gland nut fell off. Also, my packing gland probably needed to be fixed because I was always having to mess with the thing to get that drip every 30 seconds or so. It was pretty annoying because the bilge would go off several times a day. I would prefer a dry bilge.

I love the idea of saildrives. Are many people with saildrives comfortable with them as far as safety goes?

[Dulcesuenos]

We don't worry about ours but we have the old tough sd20's that rarely have an issue. Sure its a big hole in the bottom but the seals are very tough and barring a really big oopsie, pretty bulletproof. I bet more sailboats have sunk from shaft struts ripping out then sail drive seal failures.


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[SV DestinyAscen]

Many horror stories are caused by bad installs. Thousands are installed and a few morons with hangover screw up the surface prep, owner/builder didn't pay for the metal bracket ring, a few poor torqued bolts and you have internet horror stories compounded by hearsay. Then no amount of reason will change minds. Like ventilation providing healthy aerobic blackwater tank