First post, so be nice to the new guy.

I need to replace the drives on my 1993 35' fountain. I would like to upgrade to B1 XR drives. I have read posts concerning soft gears and front seal problems on the XR. I would like to avoid purchasing drives with these problems. The only way I know to avoid these drives is to understand the drives affected. Does anyone know the SN range or date range of drives affilicted with these problems?

Why not convert yours to XRs. Send them to Imco have them put a race tower in them and machine upper cap(for stud kit). Then get XR gears from Merc (of course you will need different bearings and races
). Put Imco propshaft w/ billet carrier and vertical shaft in lower.You will be able to use same size u-joints.

Or just buy my set of IMCO SC uppers...fully freshed up.

Max Machine Worx are great to deal with. Follow up great. I had a problem with a seal and they overnite it.

I've done the conversion and still had problems. I ended up buying new xr's from doller marine. They were about a grand less and free install. Plus a warranty. After countless breakdowns and ruined weekends and weekdays (my wifes rants) I just said screw it and bought the XR's with drive showers. And happier for it. I dont think a serial number range has anything to do with it. I only had merc 500efi's. My XR's have been hanging so far. Good luck

Max came with a great bearing system for XR and X gears. Since Merc does not sell replacement needle bearings for the gears (XR and X). Max's is a non-full compliment needle bearing that is bigger and will take more load,rpm. So if you get water in your drive or lose a needle bearing, Merc does not have a replacement, call Max Worx.

BTW, Torrington will not sell Merc's bearings to anyone. Its a Merc item only. Imco can't even get them.

Thanks for the feedback. I like the warranty of the Mercury product. I'll let you know how my 525SCs work with the XR drives.

fullthrottle42,

What drive shop company did the conversion work for you? Thanks

So Merc had a bearing made by Torrington especially for them?

I'm sure this is different as I am just working with standard B1's, but I just replaced all the bearings in my lower units. The original bearings were Timkens. Merc wanted something like $32 apiece. I bought the exact same bearings from AutoZone for $8 each. Standard wheel bearings. For those that AutoZone did not carry, a local bearings and seal business had them on the shelf for still under $10 each.