Bravo 3 Refresh Questions

AShipShow

Lieutenant Commander
Joined
Jul 8, 2016
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1,802
Hey guys,
Just a bit of quick background:
It's been quite a while since I've lurked around here since I finished up my 96 Bayliner restoration... Well, I got the itch again and have bought a 28' cabin cruiser with a Mercruiser 496 Mag HO paired to a Bravo 3. I'm starting to dig into the drive to see what I'm dealing with. The drive had a decent bit of corrosion, especially around the bearing carrier. I also found the u-joint bellows must have been leaking because the u-joints were rusty and the gimbal bearing stuck to the shaft when I removed the drive. Those items have already been addressed (I removed the u-joints and stuck bearing and cleaned everything up and are ready for re-assembly).

I was able to remove the bearing carrier and cleaned things up before reinstalling. When I drained the drive oil, there were no signs of water or metal debris and the color seemed pretty normal and didn't smell worse than usual. After reinstalling the new bearing carrier, I wanted to pressure test the drive to make sure I didn't have any other leaking seals before I went any further.. Currently its sitting at 9psi and hasn't budged after 12 hours, so I'm feeling hopeful.

One concern I have is, when I pressurized the drive, I rotated the input shaft (yoke) both ways and wiggled it around and felt fine, but when I did this to the prop shaft, specifically the inner prop shaft with the prop installed, I noticed that it felt very clunky, like I could feel the gears meshing. I wouldn't say it was hard to turn, but it definitely wouldn't continue to spin if I gave it a good spin. Am I over concerned with this? or should I throw another grand at this and buy the bearing retainer tool and completely disassemble the lower?

Looking for any feedback from you B3 guys that know how the prop shaft should feel normally.
 

alldodge

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Mar 8, 2009
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42,206
That's normal for a B3, it has 3 gears messing down there and not smooth like the B1
 

tpenfield

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Jul 18, 2011
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Same here with the several B3's that I have owned. Big bearings, big gears. It won't spin freely, and as you turn the props (in neutral) you will hear/feel the gears meshing.
 

AShipShow

Lieutenant Commander
Joined
Jul 8, 2016
Messages
1,802
Phew! Glad to hear that... This project is already adding up fast and I'm only into the drive so far... I wasn't looking forward to dropping another grand in tools just so I can take it apart and inspect. Thanks for the feedback fellas.
 

Scott06

Admiral
Joined
Apr 20, 2014
Messages
6,475
Phew! Glad to hear that... This project is already adding up fast and I'm only into the drive so far... I wasn't looking forward to dropping another grand in tools just so I can take it apart and inspect. Thanks for the feedback fellas.
Look closely at the corrosion a buddy of mine had to replace his lower housing as it cracked by bearing carrier due to corrosion. I think the later ones had two annodes on the cav plate vs the original single one. Ultimately he ended up putting a second mercathode system on it with transom pucks (slip kept boat) as well as a typical mercathode on the transom housing
 
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