here’s the puller I had to use, the original two screws used to pull against bent pretty quickly due to how stuck the bearing was. So I ended up just taking some 1/4-20 thread bolts, and reinforcing them with 3 washers, and 13 x 1/4" hex nuts. Now I did have to use a pipe wrench to hold the puller in place as this bearing was so stuck, that if I cranked down hard using a cheater bar on the #8 hardened nut (on the prop shaft), the 2 lighter weight screws would start to bend.
It took some time, but it came out without heat. I knew it was going to work when the first try I had on it at least broke the bearing free from the gearcase housing (saw the salt seal crack in half).
The reason why the gearcase wasn’t shifting is because the pinion gear had a broken tooth, which had lodged it’s way behind the shift cradle, and stopped things from working.
I had a 2nd gearcase with the same issue (only shifted from neutral to reverse, no forward) that I went through today (no salt issues, came apart in about 2 mins). Same deal, broken tooth on the pinion gear lodged in behind the shifter cradle. Go figure, my 1st two of these gearcases I am pulling apart and both with the same issue.
