PSS Shaft Seals for my 54ED

[jim rosenthal]

Agree with all above. We replaced the bellows at 15y on mine, but should have done sooner. The old ones were fine when they came out, but it was time- the new bellows were also heavier in construction.

Your alternative would be GoreTex packing, which is what I might have done had it been available when I first installed the PSS seals..

[bostonhatteras]

Removing the coupling is much easier if steel wedges are used. In fact the wedges can be used to install and remove the coupling. Two steel wedges are driven into the compression/expansion slot, one per side. When I say expansion/compression slot I mean the cuts 180 degrees apart on either side of the coupling parallel with the shaft bore and perpendicular to the bolts that clamp the coupling to the shaft. It doesn’t take much insertion to open the coupling enough to enable it to be moved on the shaft. There is no heavy beating necessary. Steel wedges are available at any machine shop or vendor than services machining operations. I learned this through Rose marine Gloucester MA who is probably the most prolific shaft maker on the upper east coast. Btw to anyone who cares, I fully deleted Facebook and was a frequent poster on the hatteras owners and hatteras classic pages as Russell Harry. For better or worse, you get me back on this forum deleted Twitter too.

[bostonhatteras]

I replaced pss shaft seals after 15 years. No real wear on the carbon or stainless sealing surfaces. Comparing the old pss bellows to the new pss bellows, I’d say the old bellows had taken a set so to speak. Other than loosing its suppleness the old bellows showed no sign of cracking or being truly brittle as I could still flex it in every direction. I contemplated purchasing the rebuild kit but sense got the better of me and I realized I didn’t need the addition work of fooling with the old parts. The new pss seals performed perfectly without any further adjustment, just like the original set did. The clamps on the old bellows were as good as new when removed.

[krush]

If I was to go dripless shaft seal, I'd choose mechanical seal LasDrop GenII. Long thread about various types and discussion here: https://www.samsmarine.com/forums/sh...SS-Shaft-Seals

I ended up going traditional packing box with GFO packing.