"What goes up must come down" is about all I can contribute to your
dilemma.

If it went in, it should come out. It seems unlikely the PO who
installed it put the engine with tranny in after the shaft, the only
way I can see to make a difference in the situation as you've described
it.

However, different makers treat their systems differently. I was
offered a DS which didn't fit - and it seemed to be studs, of the sort
on an engine mount. However, the type which uses a fail-safe pair of
straps is definitely bolts in recesses for the heads based on some
nubs, rather than a fully solid material such as yours.

However, I'm baffled, given your prior assertions, that you don't
eliminate the issue by using a solid spacer, as I'm, based on your
scholarly treatise on the subject, going to do. It will have holes in
it through which the bolts pass (of course, you still have to get the
other out), making future exercises much less demanding. A cutting
wheel would have that out in short order, if you didn't need to save
it.

Pictures of what I didn't use and what I will (before polishing to
mirror, which can be seen later) are the first three in
http://justpickone.org/skip/gallery/...ar06&start=132
- the polished spacer is 6 pages further in.

Meanwhile, there's an interesting exposition/treatise on alignment by a
power boat specialist (who also has an interesting section on blisters,
but, I digress) at http://www.yachtsurvey.com/Alignment2.htm

And, back to your problem, can the stuffing box tube be slid aft on the
shaft tube to allow more movement?

L8R

Skip, off to finish the Vee LED rope lighting and then to replumbing
the head

Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
http://tinyurl.com/p7rb4 - NOTE:new URL! The vessel as Tehamana, as we
bought her

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you
didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail
away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore.
Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain