Prop. shaft centering?

[Joel H.]

I recently purchased a 1978 C27 with a atomic 4.
Today I attempted to check the Prop. shaft to see if it was centered in the shaft log. I have read a lot of posts on this and thought I new what to expect. What I found, though, was that there was not enough room between the log and the coupler to slide the rubber hose forward enough to see the end of shaft log. Has anyone here experienced this? Could the hose be unnecessarily long? Could I just trim the hose enough to expose the end?
Thanks in advance.
Joel H.

 

[Maine Sail]

I recently purchased a 1978 C27 with a atomic 4.
Today I attempted to check the Prop. shaft to see if it was centered in the shaft log. I have read a lot of posts on this and thought I new what to expect. What I found, though, was that there was not enough room between the log and the coupler to slide the rubber hose forward enough to see the end of shaft log. Has anyone here experienced this? Could the hose be unnecessarily long? Could I just trim the hose enough to expose the end?
Thanks in advance.
Joel H.

The most important centering is the shaft passing through the cutlass bearing perfectly parallel. The shaft log should fall closely into place after that unless the builder messed up, which is not that uncommon. You can easily eyeball centering from the exterior too. Start at the cutlass and work your way back. I usually do it in three steps; a rough alignment, a fine alignment then after the rig is in and tuned for a week or so one last check and alignment tweaks if necessary.

Some Catalina's have very short access between shaft flange and stuffing box, it is what it is..

 

[Joel H.]

Thanks for the reply Main Sail.
The shaft appears to pass through the cutlass perfectly. That is, the cutlass is wearing evenly all around fore and aft (I.E. Parallel). It makes sense to me that that would be paramount. I would be happy to leave it at that.

On the other hand the shaft is off center of the log. It's very close to the bottom as it exits the hull. In fact it rubs lightly for about 1/5th turn. Which, I understand, means the shaft has a little run-out. As I see it, and feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, the only concern, as far as centering in the log, is the possibility of wearing through the log tube. Is that correct? I do not see any signs of wear-through.
Would you be happy with this condition?
Again, thanks.
Joel Heberlein

 

[Joel H.]