ok the motor ate up another starter I have been round and round with the different ford starters. the 302 had a long and a short snout starter in the auto world they were for auto or manual trans. the boat takes a short snout starter and i had two old ones rebuilt but they didn't last I just bought a napa marine 18-5903 which is a short snout starter but it has a tab on one side which stops it from seating correctly. I am not going to take a new $300 starter to the grinder. I was going to just swap housings but the newer napa is slightly wider than the older ones. any ideas or leads??
here are pics of the two side by side the older on the left the newer on the right and the tab at about 3 o'clock , the second pic the tab can be seen at about 12 o'clock, and the 3rd pic is the old starter with no tab.