Gimbel bearing replacement

[Tom Houseboat]

WHEN I PULLED THE UPPER UNIT OFF OF MY vp 290 OUTDRIVE THERE WAS WATER IN THE DRIVE SHAFT BELLOWS. NEEDLESS TO SAY THE DRIVE SHAFT WAS RUSTED AND THE U JOINTS WERE RUSTED ALSO. THE PROBLEM IS NOW I HEAR A BEARING NOISE WHERE I THINK THE GIMBEL BEARING IS (NOT SURE IF THATS WHAT ITS CALLED). WHEN I GREASE THE FITTING BY THE THE BELL HOUSING IT QUIETS DOWN A BIT. MY QUESTION IS DOES THE ENGINE HAVE TO BE PULLED OUT TO REPLACE THAT BEARING AND IS THERE ANU UNFORESEEN ISSUES I MAY NEED TO KNOW ABOUT IN THIS REPAIR?

 

[craze1cars]

Re: Gimbel bearing replacement

I'm not familiar with 290. But...{And therefore I have edited out the remainder of this post where I had no idea what I was talking about....}

 

[Don S]

Re: Gimbel bearing replacement

Please turn off the cap locks, makes my head hurt to try to read.

Your drive does not have a gimbal bearing, you do however have a primary shaft in the flywheel cover that has either 1 or 2 ball bearings. (number of bearings depends on which engine you have). The bad news is that you do have to pull the engine in order to replace those bearings. It's quite normal for water to get into those bearings when the bellows fail. The ujoint yoke gets rusty and damages the seal into those bearings.

 

[Tom Houseboat]

Re: Gimbel bearing replacement

Does the primary shaft need to be pressed out by a machine shop or can this be done by ordinary tools...The engine is a AQ260A, small block GM 350...Thanks for the answers!!!

 

[craze1cars]

Re: Gimbel bearing replacement

Clearly I was flat wrong in everthing except my first sentence. OOPS!

So I will go back and delete the remainder of my response to avoid future confusion....

My bad.

 

[Don S]

Re: Gimbel bearing replacement

You have the 2 bearing setup, most of it can be done using a mallet, there is one bearing on the shaft that should be pressed off. Any shop can press it off and the new one back on very easily and quickly, but you should be able to do the rest.
Here is the instructions for replacing the bearings and seals.
http://www.4shared.com/document/wpCVjUgC/Flywheel_cover_bearings.html?

PS: you also don't have to pull the complete outdrive to remove the engine, only the upper gear box.
On these Volvo drives, you can pull the upper, replace the bellows and be done in 30 to 45 minutes.