Short profile upper unit repair

"I've got a '75 electr

"I've got a '75 electric shift stringer that let go on the lake. While tearing down the upper unit, I found the water pump shaft had stripped off and broke off in the upper pinion shaft. What I'm wondering is how I'm going to be able to remove the pinion gear from the shaft with it stripped and not being able to get a tool inside it with the piece of lower shaft still inside it. I'd rather not have to replace the entire bearing hsng. with the shaft and gear if possible. Any Ideas?"

I'm not sure just what mod

I'm not sure just what model you have but if the shaft has broken the bore where the bearing race sits for the rear bearing on the input shaft is most likeley been damaged. This is common in some of the OMC drives.
This is easy to spot because the bearing race will be broken / cracked. If this has happened the case is junk and must be replaced because the bore is to large for a new bearing.

Now I'm going back a few years and someone may have come up with a new over sized bearing to fix this problem by now. But the case will need to be bored out for the larger bearing if you can find one.

What I'm saying is the shaft could be the least of the problem. You may need a new case and it could be cheaper to either find a good used complete unit(if you can) or just buy a new one.

As I said I do not know what model you have and this may not be the case with you're unit but I thought I'd let you know it could be a problem depending on what you have before you spend a lot of time and money fixing the unit.

Good luck.

"Thanks for the reply! I was a

"Thanks for the reply! I was able to get everything disassembled, and the bearings and housing(s) are fine. The shaft that broke is the water pump shaft that comes in at the swivel housing up through the pump. It broke off in the pinion shaft above that. I'm going to replace the shafts, seals and go ahead and do the ball gears and water pump as well."

"Dave,
Glad to hear the case

"Dave,
Glad to hear the case is ok. That would have put a big hole in the old bank account if it was bad.

Hope it all gets back together and works out for you."