velvet drive problem

Its broke. Likely fragged a forward clutch plate.
Stop running it before it damages more expensive parts inside.
Arrange to get it rebuilt or if your handy at all rebuild it yourself. Parts are about $500 with a fresh damper plate. Its as easy as a tranny can get. The shop manual is in the CCF reference area.

Thank you both for replying so quickly. I do know how to rebuild the velvet drive. I kind of knew myself what it was but I never had a boat have these symptoms before. I was hoping for a easier solution but I guess ill remove it and see what the cause of the problem ill check both of what you said and will probably do the whole thing since ill already have it apart. Ill keep ya posted and yah i already know about skidim. They are great and wonderful customer service and already have alot of my money from another velvet drive for another pain in my butt boat

ski dim price , rebuilt RH starter $196 , brand new RH starter from amarket $139 , altenator $166 , amarket $120.               http://www.amarket.com/mes337ml.htm

I've just been through a second tranny rebuild. Note VERY carefully where each snap ring comes from and put them back in the same place. They are different thicknesses, it matters, and you don't want to swap them around. My tranny has burned up twice because a previous rebuilder, probably an amateur like most of us, wasn't very observant. If you do it wrong, you'll mess up the clearance between the plates, they'll slip, and you'll overheat the tranny. Been there.

Incidentally, the snap rings aren't exactly intuitive as to where they go. One actually acts more as a spacer than a snap ring, so if you try to put the ring in place that looks like it will fit in the right groove, you'll probably switch them around and mess it all up. An experienced rebuilder gave me that tip, and that's probably what happened to my tranny.

That said, it's not a very hard job, and well within the skill set of the average wrencher.

And Aftermarket Marine is by far the least expensive supplier. Got 2 kits from them.

Thomas

What's the dif between "friction material" and brass for this issue? Does it matter which goes in the velvet drive? Is Amarket stuff consistently lower than skidim? But do they give inferior or auto-type materials instead of marine?

thanks for all the great input guys i made sure all the parts we put back the way they belong. It turned out I busted several teeth on the planetary gear. Thank god i had a spare from a extra tranny in the garage from another boat. Cleaned the tranny through and through. Not sure what cause the breakage. Bought the boat used about three years ago so I don't know how the previous owner treted the tranny. He took care of the rest of the boat pretty well. No other damage in sight. went ahead and swapped the rear clutches out which were picked from skidim a few months back. Decided not to use any of the other parts fom it because it kept burning up the oil pump and not sure why. Thanks again for all your input.   Happy boating to all

amarket kits are from alto , all plates are bronze just like factory , I bet ski dim sells alto plates and kits.              http://www.altousa.com/pdf/catalogs/catMarine.pdf

the kit amarket sent me had bronze plates , I didn't even see fiber plates listed on alto's site for the 71.                            http://www.altousa.com/pdf/catalogs/catMarine.pdf