Hey guys I trying to get my boat ready for the season but this year i'm not in a rush to get it in so... I want to take my outdrives off and sand them down really well and get them all smooth and repaint them so they look good. I'm starting to get some bubbling from the salt water so I want to try and due this, but I have never removed a drive before and was trying to see if there is a DIY write up somewhere with pics etc.

Boat Info: 1989 Formula 272 w/t454's and bravo one drives. Any help would be great.Thanks

The boat in question:

Taking the drive off is very easy. But, if you're talking about taking the gimbal and transom assembly off also for painting, that's a much bigger project. You should post this question up in the Tech Forum, you'll get 20 replies in 20 minutes. Remember to state how much of the drive unit you want to remove.

If you are just thinking of painting the outdrives, not sure you need to remove them in the first place. Bolted to the transom makes a pretty good stand to work on cleaning them up! Sand them and mask off everthing you don't want black (or silver from your pic).

I'm anal about my skegs looking perfect. Inevitably every year I will hit some debri on the river that marks up the skegs. Every spring I prep them with a fine Scotch Bright pad, mask them off, and shoot Mercury Phantom Black from a spray can. Good as new!