New Strut and now shaft wont turn

[Muffy]

I have a 1984 newport 30 mkIII.
The bronze strut was rotted thru and broke so i got a replacement.
the shipyard put it on and reglassed the area and tightened my stuffing box.
as soon as i splashed from the boat lift i started the motor and tried to shift into fwd.
the motor dies as if you were in a car letting the clutch out with the emergency brake on.
i have a brand new out of the crate westerbeke 2 cyl 17 hp motor in this boat, and a self feathering 2 blade prop on the shaft. it ran fine with the broken strut but now it kills the engine when i shift into either fwd or rev. i never had any issues with the gear box shifting at any time before the new strut. the shipyard guy says either the prop is on wrong or the tranny went out just as i pulled in to get hauled out for the new stut.
this is not the reason for this, i am sure.
any ideas as to what to check would be greatly appriciated.
i have backed the nuts off the stuffing box and got it to go into fwd but its straining bad and wont get over 400 rpms at full throttle, its like im towing a barge or something. the prop pushes the boat ahead very slowly so the prop is on right. even if its on wrong, the shaft should still turn. im stumpted at this point and the boat is back on blocks in the shipyard.

 

[MrBee]

Since your back on Blocks in the yard, might I suggest you disconnect the shaft at the coupling and see if it turns. If it turns free then check the alignment, if not then git the person that did the job and have them explain WHY it won't turn even when the tranny is not connected.

Bee

 

[Muffy]

i have 2 zincs on the shaft i can grab and turn the shaft with, but its not easy. i am going to see if i can turn the prop on one of the other boats in the yard and compare the force needed to turn them compared to mine. i only have 17 hp max, and one friend said that wouldnt take much to bog that down.

 

[Joseph Shirley]

You say that you backed off the packing gland nut but are you getting water through it to lube it?. If you tighten a packing gland out of the water without being able to measure the drip you may have crushed the packing tight and it will take a little time for it to relax to allow water through.

Good luck

Joe S

 

[Ted]

Shaft won't turn

I agree with MrBee. Also, after the shaft is disconnect from the gear box, make sure the coupling on the gear box will turn when in neutral. You should be able to do this with your bare hands with no additional leverage. It sounds like the guys that installed the prop strut set it wrong. It doesn't take much to bind the shaft if it's out of alignment. It's going to be fairly obvious where the problem lies once the shaft is disconnected. Good luck.

 

[Richard Bryer]

It should not be difficult to turn ( assuming you have the shift in neutral!)
Any chance the yard had the aft strap over your shaft and bent things?
Check that the coupling turns when disconnected from the shaft as MrBee says

 

[Muffy]

Thanks, i did get water thru the stuffing box AFTER i loosened it while i was in the water after i was towed back waiting for the crane again. that was the only time i could get it to go into fwd without immediately killing the motor, even tho it was only at 400 rmp max and struggling for that.

 

[Muffy]

have pics and videos of it being lifted out and at no time were the straps on or near the shaft. i am sure its in neutral.

 

[Chuckbear]

If the transmission is not somehow locked then the problem is not complicated. The engine, stuffing box log and strut must be in alignment and if they are not the shaft will be difficult if not impossible to turn. So unbolt the coupler, turn the transmission, and if it turns, let the yard know you don't buy it and they need to make the correct repairs. If the stuffing box is too tight and you have a new cutlass bearing everything should be tight but not so tight as to stall the engine. You might consider having an independent surveyor come out and look at it if the yard will not cooperate. Chuck

 

[Muffy]

the yard guy actually said "we are used to working on fishing boats so you just have to look on the internet and figure it out"
he is not the boss, but he is the one that installed the strut. i may be in for an uphill battle if i cannot fix this myself.

 

[Peter Ross]

Alignment should be done in the water, not on land.

 

[Ross]

the yard guy actually said "we are used to working on fishing boats so you just have to look on the internet and figure it out"
he is not the boss, but he is the one that installed the strut. i may be in for an uphill battle if i cannot fix this myself.

A motor shaft is a motor shaft in a fishing boat or a sail boat or farm machine. A competent mechanic will get the alighment correct, no excuses offered or accepted. Go to the yard boss and then to your attorney if it comes to that.

 

[higgs]

The shaft should turn easily when in neutral - plain and simple and it does not matter what type of boat. If the yard did the job, and the shaft is binding, then the yard did the job wrong. They should back up their work. You should not be having to sort this out. Let us all know who the yard is so others here can avoid problems like this.

If you have already paid the bill, I would consider a lawyer or small claims court if the yard is refusing to back up their work.

 

[BobM]

Wow...

So sorry to hear about your trouble. Sounds like they blew alignment of the new strut to the back of the engine, either that or something moved since the install. As others have said, alignment must be fine tuned in the water. However, that shouldn't affect things to the magnitude you are seeing.

If you are on the hard, I suggest you back off the packing nut entirely and see how it turns. Be sure to lubricate the strut bearing with water first or it will certainly be hard to turn. If it is still hard to turn, look at where the shaft passes through the stuffing box fitting. Is it roughly in the middle, or at an angle? If it is at a severe angle you probably have a alignment issue between the strut and the engine. At this point, it still wouldn't be certain whether the strut was oriented correctly or if it might just be that the engine is incorrectly situated on its mounts to align with the shaft.

In some cases simply rotating and reclamping the stuffing box hose can make a significant change. Given what is going on, that is unlikely to be the case here. I find it hard to believe that these guys won't make this right as it is so likely to be a lousy alignment.

Were you there to watch their work? They should have spent a fair amount of time using either a laser or other tools to make sure that the strut was lined up properly before they tightened it down.

 

[BobM]

One more thing. Even though I know I had only tightened my stuffing box a turn and a half I had problems. The first liquid I observed dripping out was probably liquid wax or teflon. I was able to loosen it up and it now is fine, but it is likely that a professional put 1/4" in the stuffing box instead of 3/16" that was probably required. Note that this certainly wasn't enough to stall the engine, but could have causes heating that could eventually have warped something. When the engine was running were you hearing any ringing sounds?

 

[Muffy]

when i brought it in it was running like a champ with a little bit of vibration that i thought may be caused by crusty stuff on the prop. it never had a problem shifting into either gear, no noise, no anything except the minimal vibration which turned out to be the strut problem. when i turn the shaft by hand and my buddy is at the end of the prop, he says it looks perfectly straight, so we are going to check the shaft monday morning with a micrometer.
i never saw a laser or any other tools, besides a screwdriver, hammer and chisel, and allen wrenches. i stopped in at my break and my lunch but they were not actually doing anything to it while i was there.
i am just sick to my stomach about this, its amazing weather for southeast alaska and im in a shipyard watching the sailboats go sailing by.

 

[Ross]

I don't know what you can find with a micrometer. I would remove the bolts that hold the coupling to the gear case and see if the shaft turns freely and if it is concentric with the output flange on the transmission. If the yard removed the shaft when they changed the strut or if they simply removed the old strut and allowed the shaft to sag and slid the new strut onto the shaft until it touched the hull they would have forced the shaft down. If they didn't measure the distance from the end of the shaft to the hull they would have no way to know where to locate the new strut. They shouldn't presume that they were precisely the same. I would uncouple the shaft from the tranmission and check that alignment first. Then if I could adjust the engine mounts to correct the alignment I would do that. The angle of the bore for the cutlass bearing determines the angle of the shaft and the fore/aft placement of the struct determines the vertical position of the shaft. If anything was crownded(forced) into place then the strut may have to be removed and repositioned.

 

[Muffy]

thank you Ross, i will take that advice with me in the morning and see what i can work out with the yard. i met with one of the yacht club members today and got numbers for local mechanics and a number for the best shaft guy in town, i sure hope thats a good thing.
i will post what happens with the yard 2moro. thanks again to all the responses

 

[RichH]

A strut should to be as properly aligned as should be the stuffing box (centered) and the engine. If the shafting is 'crashing' (or is being restrained) onto the cutless bearing as would happen with misalignment it will 'bleed off' significant horsepower from the engine.
The strut can be aligned by trial fitting (with 'new' cutless bearing installed by installing shims if needed under the bolting & before epoxy application to 'bury' the bolt heads) so that there is 'equal clearance' of the shaft (the shaft will be laying on and touching the 'bottom' of the cutless). If the shaft is not precisely parallel and concentric (even as the shaft is 'laying on the bottom' of the cutless bearing) you will 'crash' the shaft into the cutless - measure the 'clearance' with wire feeler gages. Another (but laborious) way to check the correct position of the cutless is to unbolt the transmission coupler, remove all the packing, and then 'orbit' the shaft from the transmission end and find the center of the 'orbit'; if the center of orbit of the shaft is off then this indicates that the strut is misaligned with respect to the engine.

What has probably happened is that the yard applied the strut without the shaft in place and never aligned the strut to the in-place prop shaft and most probably have somehow 'cocked' the strut when they tightened it (due to 'tolerance spread' of the bolt holes, etc.). Since the shaft is now hard to turn, there is almost no other earthly possibility than the cutless is now firmly binding against the shaft; and, the cutless will very rapidly fail/wear if used. I would not accept this work; and further, would absolutely insist that a correction be performed ... and I'd keep this on a 'friendly basis' and with no discussion of 'better business bureau', 'lawyers', etc. etc.

 

[Hermit Scott]

The BBB is a joke. I know of car repair shops with umpteen complaints against them. National chains, and they still get plenty of business. A lawyer, now that's a different story.
Hopefully your yard manager is a reasonable person. What RichHsays is the most likely cause of the shaft binding.
What BobM said about 1/4" packing instead of 3/16" would definitely add some drag but I don't think it would drag as much as you are talking about. I have put 1/4' in a 3/16" packing gland and hand turned the shaft. If the yard did do that it will cause alot of heat and ruin the shaft.
Muffy when you said you'd check it with a micrometer, did you mean dial indicator? A dial indicator will tell you how much run out your shaft has as it's mounted, but that's not the problem you are having.