Stuffing Box - Repacking

jbarnes11 · **Joined:** 10 Feb 2008 18:03 **Posts:** 48

Tell me what you had to do when you replaced your shaft...

Looks like it would be involved.

berwick · **Joined:** 21 Oct 2006 18:12 **Posts:** 325

I took off the stuffing box/hose and the prop in the hope I could slide the shaft past the rudder skeg - but no such luck, real close but I could not do it so I removed the bolts holding the strut (need to pick out the filler covering the heads of the bolts) and dropped the strut with the shaft. In most cases the nuts are easy to get at but in my case the generator is on top of it so it wasn't easy. I wanted to replace the cutlass anyways so this worked out well and allowed me to bring the strut home to work on getting the cutlass out. I measured the shaft taking into account the length difference in the new flexible coupling I was putting in. I replaced the cutlass along with the shaft and reversed the order to put back together. I believe I used 3M 4000 UV to bed the strut. The shims that the strut sat on were metal and corroded so I made up new ones from fibreglass. You can add more shims to either the front or back of the strut to have the shaft line with both sides of this strut and the middle of the tube? that the stuffing box hose goes on, then it should go to the middle of the coupler, I adjusted my engine mounts a bit to line things up as close as I could before sliding the stuffing box on. Then I did a final check of the alignment, meant to do it again in the water but forgot to. Hope this helps

Richard
#136
Salvation

Velera · **Joined:** 29 Dec 2006 09:38 **Posts:** 656

I want to apologize for my earlier response. I did not recognize the anti vibration unit on your shaft and assumed that it was part of the other engine configuration (not a W50). In rereading my post I was very abrupt about something I clearly did not understand.

efgrina · **Joined:** 23 Jan 2007 19:04 **Posts:** 10

Just completed repacking with 3 rings of 1/4" GFO. I had 4 seasons on the previous packing + unknown # of years by PO and acted out of guilt not necessity. To remove packing I used a drywall screw which while turning after bottoming out pushed the packing out nicely. Was careful to avoid scratching the shaft during this procedure. It didn't seem to be an issue as there was room to slide the packing nut toward the coupling and off the portion of shaft where the packing resides in service.

Found only two rings of ~1/4" flax packing in the box. Getting two rings back in was pretty easy, the 3rd was bear. I made a half round collar of 1" id PVC pipe to go over the shaft between the log and the female nut. I used a wrench handle to "gently" lever the packing nut back against the PVC to push the packing in, repeatedly resetting around the circumference. Ultimately what worked best was a 1/4" square stick of wood which I rasped down to 3/16" near the end and used as a ram against the packing, pushing it back into the nut. Caution to not leave shavings inside the box. The challenge was to get the packing far enough in to allow a few threads of engagement by the packing nut. Once on, I tightened to push the 3 rings back a little further and then loosened a little and set the locking nut. Will have to pay lots of attention during launch later this week to make final adjustment.

My thanks to others who posted their advice on this site - it was encouragement I needed to attempt it myself.

POSTSCRIPT

August 2010 Stuffing box runs cool to the touch with no visible drips.

E Grina
Cricket #145

Tartan37.com

Stuffing Box - Repacking

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