I blew a bravo today , feels like it droped the bottom out of the forward gear, does not move in reverse either, so i want to rebuild it myself i do my own motor rebuilds but have never done a drive , how hard is it to do and is there any special tools needed.

thanks

You will need to get a service manual for your year drive, they have a few to chose from, But to get an idea check this link out. Open it up and find service manuals and open it up then open up number 11 And look over it to get the idea of what you will be in to, Also as you move down the pages about five pages down you will see an index of the service manual outline, And there will be blue on the right side of the page, You will be abel to open the black part in the middle of the page to go to the area you want to see.Good luck with it.http://www.boatfix.com/merc/mainmenu.pdf

Very simple repair.. Don't be affraid to open it up. Lay everything out on a bench and just put it back together the way it came apart. There is not much to a drive once you get it torn down. If you have a good amount of tools the only thing you will need is a special wrench to retorque the large nut by the drive shaft. It just went to my local marina, and they let me borrow the wrench and i did it in the parking lot. Jeff Wurl

I am sorry to tell you, but you need quite a few special tools. You cant just take a drive apart, replace the gears and put it back the way it was. Well, I guess you can, maybe you will be lucky enough to get everything set correctly, but I doubt it. You will need to reset the gear depth, the lash, preload on all the bearings, etc.. I am not saying it is extremely difficult, but you need to get it correct. If not, those $1500 XR upper gears and $500 lower gear set you just bought, may not make it down past the first "No Wake " zone.

I own an auto repair shop for 20 plus years, so what special tools would i need that i would not already have.

Thanks

Is it a Bravo I or and XR?? Different set up - also if it's not moving in Reverse either then you've probably popped the vertical shaft or coupler - If the "floor" popped out of the forward gear, reverse would still work fine.

Have you split the upper from the lower yet?

If you are just doing upper and its older style thats doesn't need pinon shimed you should have most of whats needed you just need driver for yoke seal (make sure you use it or yoke will hit seal) or measue depth on old one and use something to press at same depth. Will need the tool to remove and set tower shaft races at correct hight ( check manual and instruction with new gears set as there are differant drivers for depths on differant gear sets ( this is a must use tool) tool for seal on shift shaft you can try a bolt and small socket or washer but that again check depth on old seal. Lower unit you need a lot of the Merc. tools to do to correctly. plate for pinon and overall drive perload, pinon hight tool, 2 tools to slip over shafts for turning while seting up, retianer wrench, and a couple of drivers for replacing bearings and races. This is properly the minium tools you need to get your hands on do a repair. Well worth the investment.

Ilost forward and reverse and i drained fluids today and it came out pure gray and fluids was changed 2 weeks ago. would this be clutches making the fluid gray.

There is a clutch - not "clutches", nothing like a transmission clutch.

split the upper from the lower then check to see which one is not turning....

If you changed fluid 2 weeks ago and it was clean. Now it gray (full of metal) You may not have filled drive up all the way and something in the top ran dry like a bearing, must likely something in the top got hot and went. Make sure you pull lower apart and clean eveything that gray stuff will be hind all the bearing races