Fear No Evil? - Suspiscious Crack in Gimbal Housing Drive-Shaft Port

[BlueEyesCrying]

Hi Y'all

My friend and I bought a 1975 20' Sangster that came with a freshly machined 220/Ford 351 engine (pro) and totally shattered gimbal ring (con). We bought a used Alpha 1 gimbal assembly, cleaned it up, and took it to a marine mechanic to have a new bearing installed. The mechanic called later to tell me that there was a dime-sized chip and one inch crack along the crease below the boat-side driveshaft port (down from the bearing). That was news to me, of course, since I had spent 2 hours the night before cleaning this thing down. So sure enough there is a chip and crack. The boat store wouldn't take responsibility for the crack but compensated me with a used gimbal housing. An aircraft mechanic friend declined welding the crack but suggested I drill a hole at the tip of the crack to keep it from propigating.

QUESTION: The cracked area doesn't appear to be load bearing so I don't think that the crack would grow. Should I drill the hole and trust the part to the boat? I'm not confident that the tools I have are enough to rebuild the housing...

Thanks (pic attached)

 

[ohioriverat]

Re: Fear No Evil? - Suspiscious Crack in Gimbal Housing Drive-Shaft Port

If that's where the gimble sits in and i believe it is i would be leary of it not shattering, is bad luck all we have these days or what. wait for the pros to answer,good luck....