I also have an old
navico 8000 with a octopus drive. On a recent
cruise to the
Bahamas, the drive worked well for the first 200 miles, leaking little if any fluid. Then I started to get air into the hydraulics. I would bleed it, and it would
work well for 30 minutes maybe an hour even when lightly loaded. I prefer repairing things myself, but Octopus wants me to send it in (default statement?).
Is this air leak likely due to warn seals in the cylinder,
pump or somewhere else?
The Octopus procedure for rebuilding the cylinder does not sound difficult. Their
rebuild kit includes seals and o-ring for all their models. It sounds like the seals for the cylinder are metric hydraulic
parts such as U cup seals. So I would prefer to get just what I need locally.
Any feedback is appreciated.