shaft aligment and packing question

I'm going to work full time on my stuffing boxes and packing. I'm getting distracted by other projects but this will prevent me from going in soon.

As some of you might recall, my port shaft was "just" touching the shaft log on one side. I talked to a local mechanic who is highly recommended and he assured me that if there were no vibrations/noise before AND no evidence of interference (not a mark) then the shaft not being centered is due to the blocking. His advise was put it all back together and then re-align after a few days in the water. He's going to help me with that.

I understand the concept of finding the center of the shaft log when the alignment is done. But, I repacked one side with 3 rings of GFO and of course the packing doesn't allow you to "feel" any up/down or side to side movement.

How is the alignment done then? With the packing removed?

On the packing itself (doing this for the 1st time), I cut the three rings and pushed them into the packing nut which I then slid down onto the shaft. By doing it this way, I had to gently tap it onto the shaft because the GFO was slightly larger. Is this ok?

I saw a picture of the rings wrapped in positions around the shaft and THEN the packing nut was slid down and hand tightened. If this is the preferred method, I can re-do the one side I did.

thanks,
Bob

Bob:

I'd check both sides and see if the "blocking effect" is consistent. If the shaft positions are different I'd disagree with your local expert, but that's just my two cents.

On the packing, I prefer to push each ring in, one at a time. That way, you can ensure the joints are staggered. it will be tough but the packing should enter the nut without having to thread them in. if you are confident that your joints are staggered, i'd go with the work done.

I'd make sure you got the correct size packing. The OEM for your log should have a table inidicating what size flax is needed for a given box (which should fit a given shaft size). the "...because the GFO was slightly larger" is a potential indicator something may be off a bit. If larger than the old flax, that's possible depending upon how you measure the two.

thanks Mark, I'm going to dig into this a little deeper, he's going to stop by over the next couple of days.

Bob