Drive shaft stuck in outboard

[ranger26]

Hi, I've got a 1993 8hp evinrude outboard, and I was recently trying to service the impeller. The drive shaft is supposed to slide out of the crankshaft when the gearbox drops off the bottom. Unfortunately, the drive and crank shafts seem to be frozen together.

I've been spraying pb blaster on the two parts for the past couple days, but haven't made any progress getting them apart. I've put a slide hammer weight on the driveshaft and have been hammering it against vice grips clamped onto the driveshaft, but it hasn't moved a bit and I'm worried about damaging the shaft.

Has anyone else had this happen? I'm wondering if there is some way to pull the two apart that I haven't thought of. I'm not sure if I can even get the crank shaft out with the drive shaft stuck in it in order to take it to a machine shop. Any ideas?

[micah719]

There was an ancient thread revisited just recently about penetrating oils. Apparently acetone and auto-tranny fluid is the cat's whiskers for loosening stuff. At least that's what I remember..

[colemj]

You disconnected the shifter shaft, right?

I have had the drive shaft stuck pretty tight in the crank several times, but they always came apart using the tricks you have already tried.

Mark

[ranger26]

I was able to remove the powerhead by destroying the impeller to drive shaft key, so I've got the power head sitting upside down so that the penetrating oil will run down into the joint. I'm thinking the next trick will be heating it up, but that will likely destroy all the seals nearby.

[ranger26]

Well, I was finally able to remove the shaft. In case anyone else encounters this, I removed the seals from the crank/drive shafts and soaked with pb blaster for a few more hours. Then, I heated up the joint until it was almost red hot and hammered with the slide hammer. It started moving very slowly at first, but eventually came apart.

[GordMay]

Greetings and welcome aboard the CF, Ranger.
Thanks for the update.