Cutlass Bearing

[celestine]

I presently crew onboard a Mirage 37 Ketch. The vessel is on a hard standing for now so the skipper and myself have recently extracted the cutlass bearing with a view to replacing it. We are also trying to remove the prop shaft but due to its length are having trouble getting it past the skeg. The shaft has been disconnected from the engine side so we are presently working on the pinch bolt flange on the outside of the hull. Our problems have arisen in trying to extract the studs from the flange in order for the flange to spin off and hopefully, give us the angle we need to slide the shaft past the skeg.
My question is why put studs there in the first place - why not bolts. I realise that they are there to stop the flange spinning and therefore unscrewing off but the studs that have been fitted have minimum thread to put a lock nut on. Bolts would have been the easy answer as they apparently only screw into the fibreglass.
Any suggestions from anyone who has had similar problems would be appreciated.

 

[gb44]

I had this problem on a boat and ended up lifting the engine and withdrawing the sahft into the cabin. By the way they are cutless bearings designed so that abrasive paticles in the water do not cut into the shaft

 

[celestine]

Thanks for the info gb44. Much appreciated!