David, I am presuming there is a motor with a gear on top, and a gear on top of the shaft? Flexidrive? That goes to the prop.

i am also assuming the380 and 540 refer to the brushed motor can sizes? Unfortunately the motor shafts of the two motors are different sizes, and in any case the gears need to be th3 same pitch so they mesh properly.

Motors in this size are very common and inexpensive. However getting the right combination of gears for motor/shaft may be an issue.

Is all this right so far?

Ashley

Hi All,

For what its worth model outboards are a nice idea, but my experience is not good with second hand stuff, the flexi drive corrodes and breaks if not stripped down after every run, It said the same in recent Model Boats article.

Good luck, I'd buy a new one

Regards Ray

You might check with SHG for gears – Sue Grainger is always helpful – bought some nice sets of bevel gears from them a while ago to refurbish an outboard – they did some nylon types with socket screw fastening . You can always mod those with a bit of brass tube if the centre is too big – bought some drive shaft universals from Robbe – they came with various sizes of split tube for just that purpose, Meccano Dave also supplies some pinion & gear sets too.

You could also use a pulley drive at the top on the Jacksons – they are big enough – some nice pulleys around with toothed belts

The outboards with gear drives rather than flex shafts work much better Ray ( even flex propshafts give trouble) – you have to maintain gear drives as much as any normal propshaft – all of my boats have oilers on the shafts – and the shafts get removed & cleaned after every sea run to avoid corrosion in any event So not a bad idea to look after your outboard in the same way.- some friends run a freshwater hose through their 1/1 outboards to flush out the corrosive muck after a sea run – you can even buy special adapters to run 1/1 outboards on hoses too……