rush1,
What are you trying to achieve?
Do you just want to put a split bowl on?
Do you have a split bowl and the adapter or droop?
Is your pump in good shape?
Swapping bowls is easy, I have dome it in boat lanch parking lots, for that matter, I have swapped impeller in parking lots.
This job of swapping the bowl should not take longer than three hours for a newbie. I was doing them in about an hour. Double drilled, allen bowl bolts, twin steering.
The process is simple, if the TA has silicone on the seam, grab a 2' long piece of piano wire and get a couple of pieces of dowling (I use 1") and make a cutting tool, run the piano wire through the sealant having 1/2 inside the hull and the other 1/2 outside the hull, saw the sealant loose from the bowl.
Remove the steering and gate linkage, remove the bowl bolts, grab 2- 12" long pieces of 1/2" threaded rod and screw them into the bowl bolt holes at 3 and 9 o'clock and pry the bowl out of the TA.
Clean everything up, ensure the shaft end is in ok shape and chamfered smooth, install the new bowl bearings and seal, glue the new gasket to the bowl with either High Tack or contact cement and reinstall the new bowl with a new dividing line O-ring (in all honesty, I do not use the O-ring, I install a length of piano wire around the bowl with fine line masking tape and leave it sticking out the bottom for removing later) torque the bowl down using lug nut technique and seal it up with a nice smooth bead of silicone or marine caulking.
An ice cube rubbed on your finger will keep the silicone from sticking to you and give you a pro finish...
Once the sealant dries, go boating and enjoy your efforts. The only time I pull the TA is when the pump needs to come out. Those things can be a somebitch if a gasket was not used.....
As for the stuffer, Play-dough is your friend. I actually use plumbers putty and Saran wrap....
Good hunting.
GT