prop spins in neutral

so hears the deal, the boat is an 86 sn2001. the transmission is original. motor is a 351w with 900 hours. the prop is spinning in neutral and has been for a season. i have just dealt with it without any problems. well now i need to take the boat in to have the carb tuned up and that means they are gonna use a fake a lake process to do it. ive heard its bad to have the prop spin out of the water. so i guess this means i need to get this little problem solved. i called the nautique dealership and they said there are these "packs" in the transmission that are designed to wear out and thats what the problem is. the problem with that is they want a 600 dollars in labor to get the packs switched out. does anyone know anything about this? is this even the problem? can i switch these packs myself? oh yeah and i know its not the idle speed, the idle speed is dead on. thanks for your help in advance

Yup, you have probably toasted a set of clutch packs, but it could just be a shift linkage or maybe even a stuck detent ball. Unless you are mechanically savy I doubt you could do it yourself, but its possible. You need some semi-specific tools so that you can pull the snap rings, seals and maybe one of the races. $600 is pretty cheap, but I would bet it's another $300 in parts at least. If it's the clutch packs you will eventually not be able to go forward or backwards. If you are somewhat mechanical you might want to just pull it yourself and have them rebuild it, that will save you some money. Most auto tranny shops can rebuild it for you too, its a very easy rebuild for them.

I did mine the first time and had to do it again because I screwed it up. I do know how to do it now though... Its almost like rebuilding a Chevy Powerglide transmission, just a little different.

There's this guy at CCFAN, who's like the god on marine transmission, go try there, He's name's Eric Lavine.

my prop does the same thing and always has I always figured there was something wrong with it

Borwarner trannies like a rebuild around 800-900hrs, the clutch plates wear over time.

Mine does the same as yours for a few seconds at start up and detentions, as long as your not having the tranny slipping it's not broken, just wore.

does that mean it's almost time for a rebuild ?

disconnect your transmission linkage and shift the transmission by hand, make sure its all the way in neutral.

also, how much force is the prop spinning with? when I rebuilt my transmision, the prop spun in neutral, but not with any force. I could hold the prop and keep it from spinning, if thats the case, its not a problem.

dont cut your hand off tho!!!!

mine spins enough to slowly move the boat forward

mine is enough to move the boat forward, with the cover up you can stop it with your foot by pushing on it pretty good. this totally sucks though, 600 bucks is a lot for a college guy

my '88 does the same thing. however, if i shift into reverse briefly and then back to neutral it stops...go figure...

Just tie it from the rear ring. You'll get used to it.