Yesterday in my 26 checkmate i was cruzing around 48-50 mph calm water nothing crazy. i hammer down and trim it up for about 30 sec or so, then i had to back it down to a 5mph. as i start slowing down i hear a Rapping sound. almost like a u-joint or somthing. i stop, put it in nutral its still doing it. rev it up a little and the sound goes faster.
so i limp over to the boat ramp, on the way i hit it just to see and the sound gets faster in and out of gear. the 1 or 2 times i put it in revers it seemed to stop.
pulled the boat. fired it up at my house on the trailer. sounds like its the drive.
i pulled the drive off and fired the boat up again and it seemed to be gone.
the u-joints looked perfect and felt fine, everything looked ok. the prop had normal play in it etc. so i pulled the top plate off the outdrive and start tearing it apart slowly (ive never done it befor) i start to find a pile of small metal pieces. id say good size pieces.
i stoped there for now. seems like i blew the drive up? what may have cauzed this? the boat is an 03, bravo, 210 hours total ( boat has been well taken care of etc etc.
i did hit a submerged log a few weeks back and it had a metal spike in it and it took a chunk off my prop. i took the hole boat to a local guy and had him check it out. he said everything looked ok, he got me a new prop, impeller etc etc and threw it on for me. said he was surprized i didnt hurt the drive. could this have been left over from that. ive put atleast 5-8 hours on the boat since that day with no issue, but maybe it took time?
i wasnt down MPH or anything.
any info would be great.

Sounds like you may have fractured a gear slightly with the log hit, then running on it caused a failure whcih broke enough teeth off that the gear now clunks every time around. The entire unit should comae apart to inspect for other damage related to the metal. If you didn't file an insurance claim before, you may want to now and get it all covered, hope he saved the prop.

Yep, what he said is correct

I agree.. time to call your agent!

well, we just pulled it apart to find a few teeth missing on the upper gears.
he did save the prop, and i did call my insurance co. they told me not to touch it untill they decide weather they need to see the damage, or just get pics. i asked how long, she said 48-72 hours. i said, yea sure i live in mass, this weekend is the big poker run and probably the last weekend to use the boat, sure i'll leave it apart and wait on you.

so we'll see. i told my buddy to rip it down, check and replace anything that needs it, etc etc. take pics and just see what happens. worse case i will pay out of pocket. i figure the insurance will screw me up anyway. we'll see.

Take it apart, order parts, but give them a chance to look at it before you reassemble it if you can. If you don't have exclusions on your policy they will pay toward repairs maybe the whole thing depending on policy.

to late, im already back together and running. i still have not even got my paper work from them. if i held off i would have missed a great weekend this weekend. friday and sunday was just great!!!

What did you end up replacing ? I just busted the drive gear and the cap and I am trying to decide what I will do ....my drives are pretty old but $$ is tight right now .....m

i replaced the hole top end, cleaned and checked the hole lower end.
im still waiting on the bill