Wedge Warning!!

Have a 2 year old Suzuki 175hp. Recently purchased a “Wedge” to use on short haul trips. I installed the Wedge to the left (port) hydralic ram shaft a few times over the summer. When I had my boat winterized two weeks ago the boat mechanic told me I had broken the grease fitting above the shaft by putting the Wedge on the left ram. He told me to only use the Wedge on the right (starboard) ram. Gonna cost me some bucks to have the old grease fitting drilled out and replaced. Wish I had known.

Get an easy out and do it yourself. No need to pay $150 for 5 minutes of work.

I will give it a try if I can get to it.

I tapped a srewdriver into a broken one on my motor. turned right out. Easy fix.

you can also use a small torx bit,they make great easy outs if you have any.
grease fittings normally arent cranked down too hard as they are a tapered pipe thread.
that said,there are the kind that are a drive in type and drilling them can actually make them spin and you will get nowhere fast.
if that ends up being the case,peen the area around it to prevent it from spinning when drilling.

use progressively larger drill bits using light pressure so as not to cause it to spin again, drill it out until you have a thin wall left.
collapse the now thin walled fitting on two sides with a small center punch and grab it with needle nose pliers and pop it out of the hole.

if you have the proper pipe tap,fill the fluted area of the tap with grease and tap new threads in the hole,the grease on the fluting will capture ninety nine percent of the chips from tapping.
cover the hole with a rag to protect yourself and blow the hole out with air to clean any left over tapping chips out,install the fitting,grease it, and away you go.

there ya go,another iowaboy fix for free !!!

iowaboy,
It’s always good to see your input when anyone has any kind of mechanical
issues.
Keep it up, Ron.

Iowaboy1 wrote:

you can also use a small torx bit,they make great easy outs if you have any.
grease fittings normally arent cranked down too hard as they are a tapered pipe thread.

Well,,,,,,,,,,,, yes and no.

While it is true many grease fittings are pipe thread, it is also true just as many are not.
I worked in a tool and die shop for 38 years and I’d say it is about 50/50 on thread type.
Those zerks which use a pipe thread have a pipe taper thread on the zerk and a female pipe taper thread in the hole.

Those zerks which are threaded but are NOT pipe thread use a hole with 1/4 X 28 STRAIGHT thread, same as a fine thread machine screw . (talking about the threads in the hole) The threads on these zerks is tapered but it is NOT a pipe thread.

Taper Thread Grease Fittings are used on cars, trucks and many types of industrial machinery. It is recommended that SAE-LT taper threads (Society of Automotive Engineers Lubrication Threads) be installed into straight holes with a 1/4”-28 UNF-3B straight-threaded hole. The included angle of the thread for a 1/4″-28 taper thread grease zerk is 60º. Taper thread grease fittings include a dirt-excluding ball check. Taper thread grease fittings are also referred to as taper thread zerk fittings, taper thread grease zerks, or a taper thread zerk.

Link to more info

Not trying to argue, just wanting to shed a bit more info onto the situation.

Thanks guys. I printed these posts out so I can remember exactly what to do. What puzzles me the most is that is happened at all.

Left handed drill bit or ez out should do the trick. Most of the time you can even do it by hand with one of those 2.

Same warning for Yamaha owners but the exact opposite side, Yamaha has their grease fitting on the starboard side.

SuperDave1959 wrote:

Same warning for Yamaha owners but the exact opposite side, Yamaha has their grease fitting on the starboard side.

Don’t ask Dave how he knows!

Denny, it isn’t often but sometimes I read the instructions or watch the video first.