Sail Drive ruminations:
I have the
Yanmar engines and
saildrive. But after watching the FP next to me in the yard for about a week I have come to the conclussion that there are very few differences in approach between Yanmars and the Volvo's. Some of these recommendations are based on direct experience with the yanmars and some on observing a technician perform the operations on Volvos.
If you are speaking of the
seals at the base of the
saildrive mounting plate, you'll have to seperate the
engine and transmission. The seperation may not be that bad. You'll have to remove the engine mounting bolts and pull the engine forward. The saildrive can then be removed from the
boat. You'll need to do so to get at the seals. The
removal of the sail drive at that point is not bad at all. Replacing the seals is not all that bad at that point.
The engine and transmission may or may not sperate easily. I didn't encounter much difficulty with removing the bolts that attach the transmission to engine. But, on one of my engines the the saildrive shaft was "rusted" to the engine flywheel. I sprayed lots of Kroil and PB blaster in the crack I was able to get between the two. I am not sure that broke them loose. I finally used a pair of small pry bars to rock the transmission and engine loose. I asked my
diesel service center about this first, they suggested this process. It worked just fine. If necessary to use this approach, try not to marr the matting surfaces. There is no fluid or anything between the two, but... Oh, this shaft is what makes it necessary to move the engine forward. I did not have to remove any of the fittings from the engine to do this.
There is another "seal" at the bottom of the
boat. This is more a barnacle sheild than a seal. This can be replaced without any engine transmission disassembly.
The shaft seals are replaced by removing the prop and zinc, then putting the prop hub back on the shaft, taking a 2 x 4 and putting it against the prop hub and tapping the shaft out. The gentleman next to us just had this done in the yard and I spent many fascinated minutes watching the technician perform this operation. Not bad to do, just don't forget to remove the shaft bolts after you remove the zincs!
I don't know if the
shaft seal are that easy to replace, there was a great deal of controversy over that issue. It took the technician a week to resolve that issue. I don't know the details.
something about having to press the seals back in place.
I used Trilux on my props. The recommendation I received was that I use Zinc Chromate then a barrier coat, then Trilux. Well, I did this, but I REALLY expect it all to be a waste. I expect the coating to abraid and I'll just end up with growth. I think You're probably just better going down and scrubbing the props down every three week or so. When I get down to
Florida, I'll dive the props and see what they look like.
Oh, and I am finally back in the water!!
Only 1 month out. Time to put the boat back together and get headed back south.
Keith