Velvet Drive question - Eric ?

Hello. I was refered to you from another site. For Eric or anyone that has advice.   I have a unique situation. "Velvet drive 71c 10-17-004". I bought a the boat in the begin of season(99 Tige 22i) knowing it had a "slipping" issue. Turns out its much worse once i got it to the lake. I was overly excited about having a boat finally. I've been on the lake all my life with jetski's, etc just never a boat owner. Big mistake not water testing, yeah i know. I suck. I knew nothing about an inboard boat other than i've been towed by them but nothing mechanically.

I pulled the transmission myself and sent off for rebuilt to a shop in FL for rebuild. Top google search result should tell you where i sent. Once returned, it died within 10 minutes of using. Worked great for a few minutes. Pulled and sent back. They said broken snap ring and fixed under warranty. Got it back installed and within 10 minutes dead again. Obviously I was fixing a symtom and not root cause. I finally got fed up and took to an inboard shop. They found that the strut was bent 3 inches to the left. They have installed new strut, prop shaft and reman the prop. They have offered to send the tramsmission to be fixed once again.

Now my question: Does this sound like my underwater gear was killing the transmission(3 inches bent) because of the misalignment? Im concerned about sending to that shop a third time. What if they arent doing something correctly? I'll never know at this point. I've obviously already spent a ton on this thing but i want it done right. I would be willing to pay to know it was done right. I've dropped a ton of dough already into this lemon so paying someone again will hurt but i want to get on the water some time soon.

Any advice would be much appreiciated.
thanks.

Eric will be along, and yes, he can fix it. He'll go through the whole thing and can probably tell you its entire history from what he sees. Hang loose.

To be honest, I was going by on the word of another DD owner whom said pulling the transmission was easy. That is the only reason i attempted myself. I removed the first time, i put the rear of the engine on blocks. When i removed the rear motor mounts the engine did not move at all. Pulled it and shipped off for rebuild. The guy told me the fwd clutch plates were welded together. He repaired and returned to me. I reinstalled myself. I knew nothing about alignment - no one ever said anything to me about it. I had to use the bolts on the coupler to draw the shaft the transmission. it was not perfectly aligned in the resting position. I mistakenly assumed all would be well since the engine didnt move. 10 minutes on the water, and then dead. Called the rebuild shop immeditately. They said to pull and send back. They didnt ask any questions. Repaired and told me it was a broken snap ring. At this point, i was thinking to myself they just didnt do something right the first time. Reinstalled and 10 minutes in the water, dead again. That is when I took to an local inboard dealership. The local guys seem to be very knowledgable and offered to put a new transmission but Im looking for some other alternatives - the reason why im here.    

Too much ignorance of these boat and trust of people has screwed me big time as you can see.

short on time this AM. call me 330-273-8291

bad bushing that was missed from ma

Eric, the tranmission is on it's way to you. They didn't give me tracking but it should be from Carolina Inboard out of SC. Thanks

Did this thing ever show up to you Eric?

you really have to check your alignment on this one, and i would hope you have a new damper on the engine

eric lavine wrote: Again there was much more damage due to mis-assembly. who was the shop that forgot to put the snap ring in?

Eric,
Add another "professional" marine trans rebuilder to your/our list!!!

"not given",
After your first post, I did google marine trans shops in Florida and several did come up so, I too am curious as to who the shop was. People do need to know so they do not make the same mistake and get screwed!!

Also, could you tell us what boat the trans is from? I take it since you posted in the "off topic" section it's not a CC! Still, many do come here with other brand boat issues so, fill us in.

Still don't want to tell us what boat you have??? We really don't care and as mentioned, we get plenty of "off brand" boat owners coming to the site for help.

I'm glad you sent it to Eric and he was able to help out.

Don't forget the alignment. Even though you have someone doing it, I would not trust it and would at least check it. We've seen plenty of so called marinas do some pretty bad work!!!

Luchog wrote: dstixs5 wrote: I bought a the boat in the begin of season (99 Tige 22i) knowing it had a "slipping" issue.

pete, need to improve your reading!

Pete's not your fault, the issue is that boats do no longer have cool names such as "Ski Nautique" "Mustang", "Separator", "Wildcat","Atom Skier" or such, they are now named 22i, X-10000 or things like that, so it's easy to get lost and not know what they are talking about!!!