Shady mechanic broke my shaft seal

[romeomikehotel]

Without getting into a ton of detail I had a mechanic that turned out to not really know anything work on my b28 to remove & replace the bad starboard transmission. In the process of putting the new one in he dropped it on the shaft seal and cracked it.

I’ve since fired him, and lost a good bit of money doing it but now me and my new mechanic are struggling to track down a new shaft seal. We’re in Fort Lauderdale so plenty of marine parts distributors to choose from but it appears a shaft seal for a ‘79 b28 is hard to come by.

Anybody care to point me in a direction? I’d really like to get back on the water and this is a big hold up.

Thanks for any help,
RMH

[scenarioL113]

can you be more specific on the "shaft seal"???

You mean "stuffing box""

What size shafts do you have? 1-1/8? or 1-1/4?

[Tony Meola]

Frank

He could also mean the shaft log. Stuffing box can be purchased through Buck. Shaft log is another story, but Buck should also have something that would work.

[Carl]

Take a picture of the seal you are talking about.

I’m thinking the ceramic seal on the PYI seals. The older ones were pretty brittle as were some other brands. Parts can be bought …just need to know which. Prop shop, marine machine shop may have

[romeomikehotel]

Sorry for not being specific enough, I only saw the part once when it was out of the boat. I believe it would be called the stuffing box? It’s two pieces of plastic that screw into each other with the wax rope or whatever inside. You tighten it down to get the 3 drops per minute or whatever the number is.

The part that broke look like both sides (me and female) were made of a white plastic.

I saw dripless shaft deals online but don’t want to mess with running coolant lines back there if possible.

I believe the shaft size is 1 1/8”

Could I use something like this:
https://www.myinboardmarine.com/product ... 4QQAvD_BwE

[Tony Meola]

https://www.ojprops.com/products/flex-gland/

Looks like it would work. Seems like it is a farily new system. I would check on the track record to date and how it has been tested. Did not see much about it on their website.

[Rawleigh]

I have run PYI for 20 years and like them. You can easily tap into your cooling tank to run the coolant line. It is pretty easy. I like a dry bilge.

[romeomikehotel]

Here’s the starboard with with seal missing and the port side with what was originally on both sides.

https://imgur.com/a/3ExKumd

[Carl]

I am thinking you may want to thank your mechanic, that gland looks like a homemade job.

Plastics for use under the water line in boats, like Marelon, do not deteriorate as other plastics do in the elements and heat. They are not prone to cracking and in general, do not look like what is shown in that picture. I could be wrong...but I've never seen a packing gland like that in a boat. That almost looks like polypropylene. Also its lacking a locking nut.

Again...I've only dealt in my world and may have missed things. If I didn't see it for myself I'd have never believed a boat builder would make a shaft log from 304SS sheet metal and tubing with a welded joint. Silverton did that for a few years. It worked well for a bunch of years then they all started to leak as they corroded away springing leaks. Unrepairable, but we fabricated a bunch of new ones. Crappy design only meant to last a few years...

[romeomikehotel]

Alright good to know I should probably replace the other one. I ordered one of the OJ Prop flex glands this morning so I guess we’ll find out in a few days if they’re any good.

[Bruce]

Those plastic glands were common on Tiarra boats behind Crusader engines. As they aged, plastic threads would freeze up.

Go with the standard bronze packing glands.
You'll need hose id and shaft diameter.
Lewis Marine in Lauderdale would have them.

[Carl]

Those plastic glands were common on Tiarra boats behind Crusader engines. As they aged, plastic threads would freeze up.

Wow..I've never seen those. Not a great material choice in my opinion.

[Tony Meola]

If you decide to not use the OJ system and still want dripless, I would look at the PYI and the Tides system. I have the Tides and I have to say it is a nice system.