Murphy at work on my prop

[OloteleMtn]

So I bought a boat in February that had been pulled out 4 months prior to replace a failed cutlass bearing and do a half a#$ bottom paint job. The prior owner was not a maintenance guy, and not a big spender on the boat, either. Long story short, despite the boat not having been operated to any degree since it was out of the water, the allegedly new cutlass bearing was failing. Hauling out in my location is not an easy proposition...
So I figure, hey i am a diver, no problem to go down and pull the Max Prop Classic, remove the cutlass bearing, and put in a new one. I need a tool to get the bearing out, so I made one in my shop. Got the wife topside to hand me anything i forgot, down I go. Barnacles have grown rapidly since i cleaned it last month, scrape some off to cut down on scrapes. Started unscrewing things, it was going great until the last screw holding the spinner halves together...the Allen head was wallowed out. Tried with several sizes to get it to budge, no luck. Used a chisel to cut a slot in the head, then used a wrench and screwdriver in the slot, no luck. No more tricks in the bag, so used the rest of my air to clean the bottom, and planned to come back the following day.

[OloteleMtn]

Next day (today) I have my hand impact driver with the flat tip and a hammer, down I go. It is a little bouncy, so not easy to get a solid connection, but i managed to get some good licks in, but that damn screw was not budging. I tried numerous things, without success. So I finished cleaning the bottom.
Tomorrow, I need to buy a portable air compressor, and will have my air impact gun and air drill to try to force this screw into submission, to finish removing the prop, to get the cutlass bearing out, that was supposedly done last September. The guy that did the work swears he used anti seize on the screws; the prior owner didn't have much to say.
Stay tuned for Round 3.

[Jim Cate]

Are you having fun yet? Enjoying the yachting life? Welcome to the real world...

Good luck... hammering anything under water ain't fun or usually productive, specially if things are moving about.

Jim

[OloteleMtn]

Well considering i have been working on the boat for 4 solid months without being able to sail it yet.......no, not fun yet.........soooon.......

[skipperpete]

Originally Posted by OloteleMtn

Well considering i have been working on the boat for 4 solid months without being able to sail it yet.......no, not fun yet.........soooon.......

Just a word of caution before you unleash the Maxprop. If you don’t have the original settings recorded somewhere( often in the Maxprop instruction booklet) you should turn the blades into streamline and observe which letter aligns with the dot. Then remove the blades and case halves. Before extracting the cone gear, again record the appropriate letter and dot alignment. The removal of the cone gear might cause the loss of 2 special locking pins if it’s fitted with that system. Older maxprops just have a plain round pin through the nut and shaft.
I have to say I admire your efforts, doing a Maxprop in the water is a helluva challenge.......if you’re in deep water it’s worth stretching a bedsheet hammock under the work in progress.
Pete.

[OloteleMtn]

Good words, Cap'n Pete, but grease obscured the existing setting of the Y axis (and probably the X axis when i get that dang screw out). Lots of things have been little mysteries i have been trying to solve, like the lack of power and black smoke under light load.....could it have been all the snot in the primary and secondary fuel filters? Or the snot in the tank, and the numerous holes in the tank bottom, along with the water and diesel mix in the area of the tank? Maybe the air filter that had deteriorated in place and was ingested into the engine? The cooling passages completely clogged with salt deposits along with the deteriorated zincs? The clogged injector certainly didn't help, nor the worn valves and seats. Having corrected all of that, i am left with the possibility of low compression, worn injectors and injection pump, and/or being overpropped by incorrect setting by the last guy who had it off. He told me what his prop settings were, but I was unable to verify if it was actually set there. As i was unable to get RPMs up to a cruising range, i will set it 4 degrees below optimum and see what effect it has, and go from there. I do not want to go looking for those little pins on the bottom, so will have a catch bucket hanging on the shaft! Thanks again......Steve

[LittleWing77]

Oh mi gawd! Olotelemtn, I want every ONE of these newbies who are going to spend the max amount of their budget on a secondhand boat - and "sail around the world" - to read this thread.

No disrespect to you in any way. But THIS is true boat ownership.

Remind yourself that once you get your systems sorted, you'll know your boat inside-and-out. Not that that's much consolation right about now.

Have you considered just plain old, dirty diesel as the cause of the black smoke (as well as the aforesaid multiple filters)....

Good luck with that cutlass! You're a brave soul (Third times' the charm!)
LittleWing77

[AKA-None]

I don’t suppose you have access to a strut pro cut less bearing removal tool? Or can make something like it? I have one but we’re a long way from each other
http://strutpro.com

[OloteleMtn]

Little Wing, it is hard to say how old the diesel is, but having drained the tank, removed it, and taught myself over 3 days how to TIG weld aluminum (I did have some experience already with steel) filling all of the numerous holes, I can say that the tank is clean, as are the filters, fuel lines and injectors, along with a new lift pump. Throttle would max out at around 1200 rpm, pretty low for a 2800 rpm rated engine (Yanmar 2QM20, 1979 vintage) and black smoke would start clogging out (oh yes, the first thing i fixed on the boat was the clogged exhaust elbow, i saved the flange and fabbed a new mixing elbow from plumbing parts.) Once I reprop it, some answers may be inferred by how it does. Good thing i was a maintenance professional in my earlier life! Thanks for the good wishes, hopefully tomorrow goes well.

[OloteleMtn]

AKA, the tool I made is similar to the Strut Pro, but not as fancy, and mine has only a single forcing screw. The bearing has not been in place all that long so it should come out pretty easy i hope, the set screw is gone already if it was ever there.........

[DirtRdEarl]

Do you have a plan B. I’ve disassembled my Max Prop Classic many times. Not a chance in ***** I would attempt this underwater. I want to hear the rest of the story. Good luck.

[OloteleMtn]

Plan B.......:
Don't screw up Plan A......! 20 years or so ago i spent a lot of time working underwater...I need to see if i can find a suitable air compressor tomorrow before i head down to the boat again to tackle that screw with my air tools. I want to find one i can run off my boat inverter or my 1700 watt generator, and that can also be rigged for using as a hookah for boat maintenance; supplies are sometimes hard to get here so thanks for the good luck wishes, i will apply it

[LittleWing77]

Originally Posted by OloteleMtn

Little Wing, it is hard to say how old the diesel is, but having drained the tank, removed it, and taught myself over 3 days how to TIG weld aluminum (I did have some experience already with steel) filling all of the numerous holes, I can say that the tank is clean, as are the filters, fuel lines and injectors, along with a new lift pump. Throttle would max out at around 1200 rpm, pretty low for a 2800 rpm rated engine (Yanmar 2QM20, 1979 vintage) and black smoke would start clogging out (oh yes, the first thing i fixed on the boat was the clogged exhaust elbow, i saved the flange and fabbed a new mixing elbow from plumbing parts.) Once I reprop it, some answers may be inferred by how it does. Good thing i was a maintenance professional in my earlier life! Thanks for the good wishes, hopefully tomorrow goes well.

Geez Louize!!

Did you also throw in a Partridge-in-a-Pear-Tree and a half-gainer-with-a-double-somersault-and-a-twist...?

Wow! Well done.

REALLY hope this sorts things out after all this effort.

If not, here's a recent thread for eddification in your downtime: "Beta or Yanmar - Which would you choose?"
https://www.cruisersforum.com/forums...se-234234.html

(This above was a joke - sort of) «groan»

Fair winds,
LittleWing77

[SVHarmonie]

If you have the instruction book for the MaxProp (and I hope you do) it makes pretty clear you shouldn't take it apart underwater. Putting it back together is a challenge! It is hard for one person to do sitting on land to get all the parts lined up and together. If you haven't put one of these together before, I would STRONGLY suggest you find one in the boat yard that the owner will let you practice on. Really. It's not rocket science, but it take a level of manual dexterity that is tough to come by underwater.

If you call the US distributer, they will, sort of on the down-low, give you a list of professional divers who have some experience doing it. Matt (frequently posting here as Fastbttms) did it on my old boat. It is NOT easy.... AT THE VERY LEAST, secure a fine screened net under the entire work area. You WILL drop small critical parts that will disappear into the bottom mud.

Also, if the cutless bearing fails quickly (like in less than 5 years!) the problem is NOT the bearing, but the engine alignment. If you don't fix that, you'll be right back with you started from, very quickly.

A couple comments that might be too late to help you but might help someone else:

I am sure you know this, but those are metric socket screws. A messed up head could be from using an SAE allen key...

It is far better to break each screw loose before removing any of them. With the other 3 screws on the spinner removed, the two pieces of the spinner can bind on the last screw and make it tough to remove. There is no way those should be stuck in place after a few months. They should come apart without issue after a couple YEARS.

[Valmika]

Originally Posted by OloteleMtn

Little Wing, it is hard to say how old the diesel is, but having drained the tank, removed it, and taught myself over 3 days how to TIG weld aluminum (I did have some experience already with steel) filling all of the numerous holes, I can say that the tank is clean, as are the filters, fuel lines and injectors, along with a new lift pump. Throttle would max out at around 1200 rpm, pretty low for a 2800 rpm rated engine (Yanmar 2QM20, 1979 vintage) and black smoke would start clogging out (oh yes, the first thing i fixed on the boat was the clogged exhaust elbow, i saved the flange and fabbed a new mixing elbow from plumbing parts.) Once I reprop it, some answers may be inferred by how it does. Good thing i was a maintenance professional in my earlier life! Thanks for the good wishes, hopefully tomorrow goes well.

DO you check the fuel pump timing? Is it smoke or soot coming out?