Packing gland question

I have a neighbor that has a mid 90's direct drive Mastercraft. His packing gland is leaking and he wants to change it out to a dripless packing gland.

I haven't really ever had to deal with a packing gland since I have had dripless in my boats so I can't really answer his questions.

Can this be done and how hard is it to do?

Thanks in advance for the help

It is not too hard. Be sure to spend the cash on the extraction tool. It is like a modified corkscrew. It will make the job much easier and quicker.

gramps do a search for dripless and you'll find lots of good info on your question. I did the same thing on my 95 Mastercraft it wasn't to bad to do. Make sure you get the one that doesn't need water to keep it cool.

Seems like you'd have to redo the engine alignment afterwards (that still scares me).

I used to think the dripless setup would really help longevity of the hull, etc. by keeping the bilge dry until I remembered that the ice chest drains into the bilge, so there'll always be water in there anyways :-)

I did it in a early '90's Tige' DD. It was a fairly simple change out to the PSS system. Call Discount Inboard, and order the parts. They helped me over the phone when I was a bit confused about alignment.

http://www.skidim.com/

Turns out the aligning was quite easy, as everything bolted back into the same previous positions.