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I noticed that after swithching to a metal prop on my FE cat (a MG29), the strut bushings are wearing a little faster and the fit between the bushing and the propshaft stub end of the flexshaft is looser. It looks like the bushing is wearing, not the solid stub on the flex shaft. The prop is balanced, but, since it overhangs the bushing and there is much more mass moment of interita, almost anything can cause more wear (uneven blade loads, minor unbalance, etc), than the next to no weight plastic props. I looked in McMaster Carr and they have a variety of bronze bushings that are the same dimensions as the stock strut bushings. They have oil impregnated, graphite impregnated, plain cast bronze (a harder alloy than the others) and a couple others. Seems like it would be a lot more efficient to just change the bushings instead of buying the whole new strut assembly, just to "tighten up" the clearances again. Has anyone used any of these, and if so, which holds up the best? From reading their descriptions, it looks like the plain cast bronze (not impregnated with anything) would be a better alloy, but thought I would ask. I would think you would probably want to lock these in with some loctite bearing locker, too, right ??
Thanks,
Bob
Thanks,
Bob