Jump to content

Putting Stern Gland Packing on Top of Old


Featured Posts

I have a quick question on sterngland packing, I'm sure the OP won't mind me tagging it on here.

 

Been doing some amateur engineering, at home over the holiday. (too cold for boatbuilding, anyway). I've converted an old stuffing box, that originally contained a cutless bearing. It wasn't what I wanted & wasn't the right size anyway.

 

sbox1.jpg

 

This is the complete assembly, I'll be welding the sterntube (made from an old hydraulic ram) into the boat, this spring.

 

sbox2.jpg

 

This shows the annular space between the shaft & bore of the stuffing box, which is 11mm.

 

Leads me to the question, does anyone know if packing is available in this size? (I'm willing to buy a roll). If not, I'll have to sleeve it down to the next available size.

If the next size was, say, 10mm........would this compress enough to make a seal? (without sleeving)

 

Cheers all...

 

I'm pretty sure I bought a box of 7/16" last year, which is near as dammit 11mm, from the local Klinger depot. They had to get it in for me from their main depot, probably the next day. If Klingers do it, it's a reasonable bet that Walkers will also. Try a web search for those two companies, as a starting point.

 

Some 10mm packings would easily hammer out to 11mm and be absolutely fine, especially the ones containing natural fibres or the dear departed graphited asbestos, but the pure PTFE stuff doesn't seem too keen on that sort of adjustment.

 

Tim

Link to comment
Share on other sites

How about this?

 

Expensive, but shows those sort of sizes are available - bit more Googling should turn some alternatives up perhaps.

 

Cheers for that, I turned a plain gunmetal bush & put some greaseways down it, so I'm really looking for the conventional greased packing...

 

I'm pretty sure I bought a box of 7/16" last year, which is near as dammit 11mm, from the local Klinger depot. They had to get it in for me from their main depot, probably the next day. If Klingers do it, it's a reasonable bet that Walkers will also. Try a web search for those two companies, as a starting point.

 

Some 10mm packings would easily hammer out to 11mm and be absolutely fine, especially the ones containing natural fibres or the dear departed graphited asbestos, but the pure PTFE stuff doesn't seem too keen on that sort of adjustment.

 

Tim

Thanks Tim, I'll give those a try.......no rush but it is all coming together :lol: ...honest...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Leads me to the question, does anyone know if packing is available in this size? (I'm willing to buy a roll). If not, I'll have to sleeve it down to the next available size.

If the next size was, say, 10mm........would this compress enough to make a seal? (without sleeving)

 

Cheers all...

 

I get all my packing from here http://www.whitby-chandler.co.uk/ they used to do all sizes.

 

They're in Penistone, not far from you.

 

Andrew

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We added a ring of 8mm to ours (takes 10mm) and they went fiarly well, it was graphite imprenated stuff orignally destined for the engine.

 

We then ended up with ptfe as its what they had in where ever i bought it from and that seems to be working so far. Our stuffing box also only accepted three turns before being within about 5mm of being level.

 

 

Daniel

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 months later...

Since my original post I bought some packing, and about six weeks ago I crawled down into the engine 'ole. Backed off the adjuster nut completely, and pulled back the 'sleeve' that pushes up against the packing - it didn't clear the thread to allow new packing to be inserted. Tightened it all back up (the adjusting nut goes all the way up to the limit of the thread), and it leaked a little less - until this weekend when it leaked (trickled) a lot.

 

Something has to be done, so I crawl down and repeat last exercise, hoping for some gap to force some packing in. This time unscrewing the adjuster results in loads of water and whats left of the old packing looking like soggy blotting paper trying to push back in. So much water there is no way, even if I could get a clear run at getting the new packing in, that I'd remove the old.

 

Then a solution occurred to me. The shaft is castellated, so I cut a couple of rings of packing, and hammered it flat. I then fed it into the stern gland sideways through the gap in the castellation, and by pushing and pulling through the gaps in the castellations managed to get a turn in. That's all it'll take for now (perhaps my packing is slightly too large, perhaps it's not fully pushed back in yet), and I've now got only a drip every minute whilst underway - best it's been in four years of ownership.

 

I'll get it properly sorted when I have the flexible rubber hose that holds the stern gland replaced this season.

 

Thanks for the helpful comments originally.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.