[spareparts]

you check engine alignment with an alignment tool, its just a shaft that you slide in thru the gimbal bearing and into the coupler, if the engine is in align, the shaft will slide in easily, if its not, it will take some force, Mercury says it should slide in with two fingers. These shaft were once only available from Mercury, but know the afermarket has them priced reasonable, try Sierra Marine, GLM, Aqua Power, etc. You might try ebasicpower.com for your parts and tools. While you're at it, go ahead and buy the gimbal bearing installer, not really need but it does a nice job and prevents damage to the beariing. You obviously have something going on there, I've been working on Mercruisers since '86 and have neaver seen a gimbal bearing that was bad from wear, its alwas been from water or alignment, make sure you check you're bellows while you have it apart. As far as greaing the coupler, i just spread spline grease( yes they have a specific grease) on the input splines when I put the drive back on, check the splines and see if they look thin and sharp,thats an indication the alignment is off or you haven't had enough lube on them