Developed an oil leak late in the season, would probably need to redo my oil pan gasket this winter. Can anyone point me to any good articles on how to remove a big block Chev from a bravo/bmax setup, no tranny. Is this super difficult, and does the drive have to come off??? How far forward does the motor have to slide to come out? Will I have to redo the gimble, etc/???

Thanks!!!

I believe the drive will have to come off. The biggest part will be the alignment when re-installing. If that is off, you can tear some stuff up.

Bring it to me I'll pull it. Drive can most likely stay on if you have enough room in front of motor which you should. I do many of these on the side. Installing some 540's in a bullet right now.

Leaving the drive on is more trouble than it's worth. It takes a half hour to drain the drive and pull it off. If you have a solid front mount plate, scribe a line around it with a machinist scribe onto the angle iron bolted to the stringers. When you put the engine back in, line up the mount to the scribed lines. Very likely the alignment will be good and not require any adjustment but check it anyway. Other than that, it's just unbolting a lot of stuff. Dont loose the washers on the back motor mounts. They have to go back exactly the way they came out. Good luck.

8 nuts to pull the drive. 10 if you have hydraulic steering. I yank the drive and pull the motor in my daytona in about 1.5 hrs average.

Check ginmble swivels and bearing while its apart.

Pulling the drive first makes the motor a breeze.

When re-installing, do your alignment w/motor still on the hoist (I used a forklift w/fork extension) ...then button up the mounts...re-check you will probably need just a minor mount adj. to compensate for the weight on the stringers. I learned this the hard way!

Pulling the drive makes it a lot easier, taking out your back seat also helps a lot. Lifting it out of a Cat makes it a little more difficult as you have to get it up pretty high to clear everthing. Forklift or overhead hoist is always a help...

As a newbie I can say all suggestions above are valid. Pull the seat- Pull the drive and just take your time and make sure all wires etc are disconnected and pull slowly. On my boat (90 checkmate ) I had to pull the motor forward(after it came off the vertical forward mounts about 2" to get around the steering. Might have been easier if I would have pulled the pumps / alt off at the front.
I was then able to turn the block sideways and go straight up with no trouble.

Also I took pictures with my phone of all disconnected wires before and after to make sure my short term memory doesn't fail me when I reinstall.

I just did this for the firs time on Sat last week and the whole thing took me about 4 hours. Took longer to assemble the lift I rented that to actually pull it.

Good luck.

Pull the drive. Two long bolts from the transom plate & bell housing two top nuts from the motor mounts. Pull the wiring harness plug & the starter cable & block ground. Drive lube monitor hose & raw water plumbing from drive or sea water pump.
Alignment is no big deal either. Takes a alignment bar & some time.
I can have both my engines in my 29 Outlaw out in a few hours. Defiantly less than 1/2 day from start to time on the ground coming out.

Yep pull the drive. Its quick and lets the engine go in and out faster. You dont have to drain the drive if dont want to, it has a check valve. That being said, its probably time to change the drive oil anyway. Have a buddy help when you pull it off. It is not super heavy but, it is hard to handle.