1960 Evinrude 40 HP, play in the crank

Evinrude Boater · #1 August 22nd, 2007, 12:32 AM

I was pulling the flywheel off with a puller and noticed the crank has a couple of millimeters of vertical play when I tried pulling the flywheel off by hand. Is that normal?

Joe Reeves · #2 August 22nd, 2007, 12:35 AM

I have a problem with millimeters...... If you're speaking of .010 or .020, something of that nature, yes that's something you'll find in all of the engines.

Evinrude Boater · #3 August 22nd, 2007, 12:39 AM

Well let's say 2 mm is the play. That's 0.079". It could be as much as 0.10" or 1/16" to 1/8".

Joe Reeves · #4 August 22nd, 2007, 01:35 AM

That does sound fairly excessive. There's a tension spring affair attached to the bottom of that crankshaft that should prevent that play.

F_R · #5 August 22nd, 2007, 08:33 AM

Well, about what Joe just said: That spring at the bottom of the crank is to keep the carbon seal up against the bottom of the lower main bearing. The seal is supposed to slide up and down on the shaft if the shaft moves up and down. It is true that the spring tends to hold the crank down, but if you lift with more force than the weight of the crank plus the rate of the spring the crank will move up.

I'm millimeter challenged too, but looking at a ruler I'd say two mm is perfectly normal.

EDIT: ok, I looked it up and 2mm = .0787". That is way more than the .011" specified in the book. But I'm sure I've seen them run with considerably more than that.