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Vetus stern gland


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OK, after 15 years in the water, the dripless Vetus sten gland has moved on from the occasional drip to a fairly regular drip, and my dry engine bilge is no longer dry.

 

This is the beast;

 

1079033979_sterngear.jpg.d58ead2b8ac3be369d9392cd49541b2d.jpg

 

So, just want to check that I'm not going off half-cocked here....

 

My understanding is that the only bit that plays a part in keeping water out is the twin lipseals in the brass bit at bottom left. There is an outer bearing at the rear of the stern tube, which will tend to limit ingress, but it isn't part of its purpose.

 

The process for dealing with the issue is;

 

  • Unclamp the prop shaft, and slide the propshaft backwards as far as it will go until it hits the rudder.
  • Hope that this gives a gap between the propshaft and the clamp. If not, disassemble the R&D coupling to get clearance
  • Undo the 3 small bolts using a hex key
  • Slide off the brass bit at the front and slide the new one (pre-greased with silicone grease) on
  • Fasten up the 3 small bolts
  • bring the propshaft forward, check alignment, and reclamp
  • Bob is your mothers brother.

 

Now, I have two options here. I can do this one weekend in the water, or I can wait until we dock her in the Autumn for blacking. There are pros and cons of each way.

 

  • If I do it in water, then there is likely to be a water ingress that may seem alarming.I can mitigate this by putting putty, plastic bags, tape around the outer bearing, which will reduce it to a trickle, and I have a good bilge pump, so it isn't particularly high risk, but should I as a rank amateur be doing this in water, or is it going to be stressful?
  • If I leave it until the Autumn, I either have to take a day off work to do the job, or pay somebody to do it for me.

 

Thoughts and comments?

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Wrap a greasy rag round the prop shaft.  Undo the retaining bolts.  Now slide the old seal off and slide the new one on.  It shouldn’t take a minute and water ingress will be minimal.

 

check alignment of the prop shaft, as misalignment is the usual cause of this seal failing.

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19 minutes ago, dor said:

Wrap a greasy rag round the prop shaft.  Undo the retaining bolts.  Now slide the old seal off and slide the new one on.  It shouldn’t take a minute and water ingress will be minimal.

 

check alignment of the prop shaft, as misalignment is the usual cause of this seal failing.

Alignment check is definitely on the cards, although likely cause of failure is 15 years use, and not actually remembering to perform the annual silicone grease top-up more than half the time.

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In my experience, if the seals are worn, then the bearing just behind will likely be too (mine was 15 years old when it did same.) To save much typing, here are my vetus stern gland experiences, and I eventually bought a Radice unit off Mick at Cheshire Marine services. Very happy with the Radice.

Starts about half way down page:

http://destinynarrowboat.weebly.com/vetus.html

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Odd isn't it.

 

After owning a boat for 15 years, you kind of imagine that you know it well. You don't expect to discover a new design flaw after all this time.

 

Well, with a newly leaking stern gland, it was good to see that the ceremonial bilge pump actually runs.

 

The design flaw is in the rear stank plate for the oily bilge. Because of the height of the shaft, the stank plate cannot run at engine bed height. So, the design starts the plate at engine bed, and follows a deep curve to miss the shaft by a very long way.

 

Trouble is the lowest point on the stank plate is actually about 2mm below the point at which the bilge pump kicks in!

 

Yes, before the bilge pump starts, it floods the oily bilge and carries sodding oil into the non-oily bilge.

 

That was a fun job to clean out....

 

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On 16/08/2019 at 20:39, Spanners said:

Changed a few seal in them over the last few years , get a spare seal carrier and fit the new seal to it then it only takes a few moments to swap over  once the shaft is slid back 

That was one of your first jobs at Pennine wasn't it?  Ian wanted to see if you could change one in the water without sinking the boat ...

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