I have been told that the Commander 31 that I purchased has been repowered with 235 hp 350q engines.
They have the open cooling system and look to be at home in the boat.
I've come to find out that the reason the port (left) engine is out, is because it sheared the key at the end of the crankshaft. The previous owner ran the engine for quite some time after he lost propulsion on this engine. Which ruined the diameter of the crank and the bore of the drive hub.
It this point, my plan is to remove the crankshaft and weld it up. Then machine the stub back to it's original diameter.
With the flywheel forward and all the torque of the engine relying on one little woodruff key, I feel that this is going to be a problem.
I realize that there are a lot of Chris Crafts set up this way but is this a weak point in the drive line? What are your thoughts?
I hit a rock and sheared mine off, I was able to pull the tranmission, found the damper hub took most of the beating and was able to get a new one and install on the crank with no problems, it's been about 10 years now.