pls help drive shaft packing

Hi,

My name is Gerald I'm from Aruba Its a nice tropical island in the caribbean and I own a '86 skinautique 2001

Anyway I'm having trouble with the stuffing box It's leaking like hell so I'm going to reaplace it but I don't know what size of packing should I buy any idea or suggestion let me know.

Gerald

Aruba

Gerald, welcome!

The packing is easy. If you haven't done anything with the stuffing box then I would guess the packing material in it is pretty much gone. Call SKIDIM and order the GoreTex replacement packing material. It's like $10.00 or something like that. I think that you'll need the 1/4" stuff but talk to Vince to confirm that or somebody here can confirm. You can do a search on here for shaft packing and there are numerous posts that explain what you need to do.

In simple terms, unscrew the packing nut and remove the old packing with a long pointed object of some sort. Replace with at least two or three pieces of the new packing material. Whatever you can fit into the packing box and still get the packing nut to start. Cut the packing material so that each piece is just long enough to wrap around the driveshaft and makes and nice clean butt joint. Stagger the butt joints of each seperate piece at least 90 degrees from each other and tighten down the packing nut again. Just hand tight, it probably won't take much. It should leak a little bit but the drip rate should be a few drops per minute while in gear. Keep checking it the first few times you use it as you will probably need to re-adjust the packing nut a few times for the proper drip rate. The GoreTex packing material is awesome stuff and some guys have even almost completely stopped the drips. I still prefer to have a couple drips. Better to have a little water in the bilge than get that drive shaft too hot. If you feel the driveshaft and it's warm, loosen the packing nut a little bit.

Hope this helps and if I'm ever in Aruba, you better beleive I'll be getting in touch with you for a little skiing in paradise!!!!!

would i use the same size packing for a 1981 ski nautique?

Mickstique wrote: would i use the same size packing for a 1981 ski nautique?

Best thing to do would be talk to Vince at SkiDim. I know that my boat needed the 1/4" stuff. Tim thinks that the 3/16" was needed. I seem to remember being told a number of years ago that 1" propshafts used 1/4" and 1 and 1/8" propshaft used 3/16". I could certainly be wrong though.

Todd, thanks for the props on the shaft packing. I can pack my shaft with the best of 'em!!!