Who can cut and respline my sporty shaft?

**roadkill636** · 01-04-2020, 09:16 PM

Looking for a few shops to PM me your rate for cutting and re splinting my 25" drive shaft to 20". Iv searched and sent several emails to recommended shops but only 1 has responded with a $400 rate

. Driveshaft is out of the case I'm ready to get this done.

**TEXAS20225** · 01-04-2020, 09:54 PM

chris carson

**RSWORDS** · 01-04-2020, 11:39 PM

Chris Carson did mine and was very reasonable and did great work

**outboards4life** · 01-05-2020, 12:07 AM

If you just need a 20 inch driveshaft, you're probably best off just buying one. They are a lot more readily available then the 15 inch.

**TEXAS20225** · 01-05-2020, 01:37 AM

Ceptin not a lot of sporty drive shafts left these days that are not eaten up with corrosion and water pump seal groves so you get a 3.0 25" drive shaft cut it to 20" it is identical to sporty machine wise its just stainless not plated

**tux974** · 01-05-2020, 06:07 AM

Chris Carson and a stainless DS also get my vote.
Keep in mind that a (real) sporty DS is brutal on cutters so I'm sure they are taking into consideration having to treat the shaft before cutting and treat again after cutting so it does not totally wipe out the cutter.
Also keep in mind if you buy a new 3.0L DS have it cut and resplined plus shipping you will still probably be over $400.
BTW, I do not suggest the SEI shafts.....JM2!

**HStream1** · 01-05-2020, 06:35 AM

Tony you are exactly correct!! Ive had my Cutter Shatter as soon as it hit the shaft. And the strange thing is not all of them have the same hardness. Some are harder than others. You really dont know what youre going to run into when resplining one. The other thing is Most shops dont have a Machine set up and dedicated to respline. Most Job shops do other work on their Mills. So Youve got tear down and set up time that has to play into the price equation. The indexing head alone is a couple Thousand dollars. Plus the Drive shaft splines on a 2.5L motor are not regular involute formed splines like the 3L are, so a dedicated cutter has to be ground to cut them correctly. The last tool and Cutter Shop I contacted about Profile Grinding me a carbide Tip Cutter to do hardened splines wanted $800.00

Its the very reason I stopped Cutting and resplineing them. I use my mill for other projects so The tear Down and set up alone was 1 hr. Then I was only charging $120.00 to cut, Machine in the lathe and Spline in the Mill. So basically i was only making $50.00 where in reality I should have been charging $200.00. I still do a few for close friends like Michael Chapman @ Calhoun Marine or George Fuller @ Fullers marine and machine. While both shops have a lathe and Mill they dont have the Indexing head or Special ground cutter.
. But Its just not worth it to do them otherwise.

Originally Posted by tux974

Chris Carson and a stainless DS also get my vote.
Keep in mind that a (real) sporty DS is brutal on cutters so I'm sure they are taking into consideration having to treat the shaft before cutting and treat again after cutting so it does not totally wipe out the cutter.....JM2.

**Merc 2.5** · 01-05-2020, 07:46 AM

I agree. Carson been doin quite a few. His prices r usually very reasonable

**TEXAS20225** · 01-05-2020, 12:31 PM

when i did nothing but lower units i did all sorts of things to get drive shafts service ready me being a life time welder helped a lot ive welded many shafts in this period of my life and not a single shaft broke afterwards

i used to send them to a guy in Minnesota 5 at a time to get resplined i cant for the life of me remember his name

it was a unusual name though, at a 100 apiece and that was long ago , i also had a special shipping container i built to ship them in so you do whats required to float most guys now days are not exposed to a lot of stuff the earlier people who worked on this sickness accommodation stuff ( boating is a sickness

)