Shaft coupler sweating ?

[iLent]

I have an ‘87 Tartan 28. The shaft seal has an excessive drip - more of a stream. The bilge is turning on about every 2 hours with the boat docked. I want to repack the gland, however, there doesn’t appear to be enough space on the shaft to move the gland without undoing the coupling to the transmission. Unfortunately, the coupling is very rusty (I assume due to the excessive drip). My thought is to remove the coupling (which apparently is going to require a blowtorch), replace and repack the gland, and I ideally replace the coupling as well. The boat is currently on the hard as I didn’t want to risk tightening the bolts too much with the boat in the water in case something went wrong. Questions:
1) Should I just tighten the gland-bolt without repacking and hope the drip improves
2) Replace the coupling and gland with new packing
3) Does anyone know of a dripless seal that is short enough to accommodate the available space? I don’t seem to have the 6 inches required by the PSS systems.
3) Is there a risk to having a rusty coupling? Could this cause a bigger issue?
4) any other ideas?

My hope is to have this done before the weekend.

[iLent]

I have an ‘87 Tartan 28. The shaft seal has an excessive drip - more of a stream. The bilge is turning on about every 2 hours with the boat docked. I want to repack the gland, however, there doesn’t appear to be enough space on the shaft to move the gland without undoing the coupling to the transmission. Unfortunately, the coupling is very rusty (I assume due to the excessive drip). My thought is to remove the coupling (which apparently is going to require a blowtorch), replace and repack the gland, and I ideally replace the coupling as well. The boat is currently on the hard as I didn’t want to risk tightening the bolts too much with the boat in the water in case something went wrong. Questions:
1) Should I just tighten the gland-bolt without repacking and hope the drip improves
2) Replace the coupling and gland with new packing
3) Does anyone know of a dripless seal that is short enough to accommodate the available space? I don’t seem to have the 6 inches required by the PSS systems.
3) Is there a risk to having a rusty coupling? Could this cause a bigger issue?
4) any other ideas?

My hope is to have this done before the weekend.