Beneteau 361 Cutless Bearing Repalcement

Jul 1, 2020
14
Beneteau 361 Lancaster, VA
Folks, I want to change the Cutless Bearing on my boat while I am changing the shaft seal. I have the new bearing and it looks like it is held in place by two set screws but the part is plastic. I am a little worried about getting it out.

Has anyone here changed thiers and how did you get the bearing out?
 
Jul 1, 2020
14
Beneteau 361 Lancaster, VA
Showing some wear, and headed South for 6 months. Dont want to deal with it 1000 miles from home and pay a premium.
 
Mar 20, 2016
594
Beneteau 351 WYC Whitby
Remove the 2x nylon M6 screws ,new ones are on amazon. Remove prop pull out cutlass . Now the bad news ,if you can't get it out you must remove the shaft . On my boat 351 the rudder had to be dropped to remove . Then from the inside in found a socket that fit inside of tube adding extensions until I hit the cutlass and then tapped it out. Mine was a tight fit phenolic ,I replaced it with the Beneteau style rubber with flange
 
Jan 4, 2006
6,444
Hunter 310 West Vancouver, B.C.
Has anyone here changed thiers and how did you get the bearing out?
Hopefully, this will get the bearing out :


After it's in, you may want to take a close look at your shaft alignment. Don't know the age of the boat but I've had the same bearing for 22 years and the shaft still has 0.0000" radial deflection in the cutlass bearing. When the boat was delivered new in 1998, a year later I did an alignment. The initial angular misalignment caused a gap of 0.008" on the 4" transmission coupling flange. I finally whittled the gap down to 0.002". I think this MAY be the reason that the cutlass bearing still remains snug around the shaft to this day.
 
Mar 20, 2016
594
Beneteau 351 WYC Whitby
Hopefully, this will get the bearing out :


After it's in, you may want to take a close look at your shaft alignment. Don't know the age of the boat but I've had the same bearing for 22 years and the shaft still has 0.0000" radial deflection in the cutlass bearing. When the boat was delivered new in 1998, a year later I did an alignment. The initial angular misalignment caused a gap of 0.008" on the 4" transmission coupling flange. I finally whittled the gap down to 0.002". I think this MAY be the reason that the cutlass bearing still remains snug around the shaft to this day.
Well If he wants to go that route not on a Beneteau , I did and my run out is .001 . You need to have a 25mm plug machined that fits tight on shaft and if my memory is correct 40mm on the od . With the new cutlass in and the bushing this puts the shaft dead nuts center in the tube with zero runout. Put coupling back on and align engine . After alignment I installed a R&D coupling which allows for vibration of engine keeping the aligment , i also Isolates the shaft from galvanic corrosion.