Stern gland HOT!

[bumblefish]

Went out yesterday, first time in the water and underway for 4 years, underway everything seemed OK. On the way back I went to feel the stern gear, very hot gland and hosing. Old style packing gland and screw down greaser. Not sure about any lubrication getting through. I have been advised to screw down the greaser until it is 'hard' and check again? Any thoughts?

 

[Bilgediver]

Probably find the grease and packing have dried out. MAybe at least slacken of the gland to allow to drip or preferably slacken off and try and get grease into the space between shaft and packing then retighten till just the ocasional drip..

Just slacken and don t remove or you might have a wet panic situation /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[ex-Gladys]

Yeah, you need the sea water bit to do the cooling as i recall, the grease just keeps the sea water out and th shaft lubed

 

[Richard10002]

The advice i've had/read is to screw it down until you just feel some resistance... too hard and too much grease is forced into the gland, so the seawater cant get through.

 

[Gordonmc]

Further to the suggestion the grease might have dried out... it would be worth unscrewing the grease pipe where it goes onto the stuffing box, then giving the greaser a few turns. If grease comes out, fine. It didn't on mine... the pipe was solid and needed steamed out.
Likely the stuffing box will be solid as well.

 

[Guest]

Slack it off ... its probably wound up tight ...

As others say you should only be a part turn over hand tight ... plus a drip of water every so often ... I reckon a driop each 10 -20 secs is ok .. some say less .. Grease is pumped by turning handle 1 - 2 turns till resistance is felt ... and my regime is 1 turn before motoring ... 2 turns after when leaving boat ... The last 2 turns then stop water accumulating in the bilges when I leave boat for extended periods. But ist not so much that once shafts starts turning again that wtaer cannot get through.

If you cannot get water to drip - then you may have to undo the gland nuts and remove packing - repack gland so that it works better.

Be careful when putting excess pressure on the stern greaser - the piping is only normally held by a soft olive and soft pipe ... you'd be surprised at the pressure that greaser can exert ... I actually blew my olive joint one time - the mess of grease in the bilge was 'orrible !!

 

[Richard10002]

[ QUOTE ]

If you cannot get water to drip - then you may have to undo the gland nuts and remove packing - repack gland so that it works better.

[/ QUOTE ]

A job for out of the water methinks

I have been told that it can be done in the water, but it's a bit risky given that the packing and the grease are there to stop all but a little bit of seawater getting through.

 

[Guest]

Did mine in the water ... was actually surprised how little water actually came in ...

I pumped a liberal amount of grease in when all was undone and last packing ring still there .. basically used last ring as a water trap ... and then the grease to help. Hooked out last ring .. pumped more grease.

I reckon gland was open about 20 - 30 mins and all I got was less than a litre of water in ...

OK - I was probably lucky and do not say that others will find same.

I also did it when my boat which draws about 1m was in water only just afloat ! So even if she did flood - she would only have gone in about 5 - 10 cms.

 

[pheran]

[ QUOTE ]
A job for out of the water methinks

[/ QUOTE ] Don't panic Mr Mainwaring. A job easily done whilst afloat and one I've done many times, even on Mobos with 2" shafts. Water ingress very much less than you may be fearing. Just make sure you prepare your new packing in advance, cut to length etc. Any water that does come in will be reduced to a minimum once you have got the first new ring in place. Cut rings 'on a slant' and space the cuts evenly round the shaft. Easy, peasy.