gear housing maintenance

[tfasbind]

I have a '85 OMC stringer 800 that I want to change gear oil in upper, lower and intermediate housings.

I have read on this forom to replace washers when doing this.

Mine uses a rubber washer on the fill holes and a plastic washer on the drain holes. I can see that the rubber washers are dented and could use replacement but cant find any to fit.

Does anyone see a problem with using a rubber o-ring of the right size instead of rubber flat washer?

Also, the plastic washers on the drain plugs see fine. Do they really need to be replaced?

 

[tfasbind]

Re: gear housing maintenance

just wanted to refresh this post hoping to get a reply

 

[whywhyzed]

Re: gear housing maintenance

I suppose the answer is - why risk $1000 worth of gears and bearings for $5 or $10 worth of gaskets. You'd probably get away with using an o-ring - although not too many modern orings are made of rubber....and you could probably reuse your other gaskets, but change them.