Driveline Parts 
There are various parts that make up the driveline including the strut, flexshaft, drive dog, etc. The driveline is responsible for transferring the motors rotational energy down to the propeller and then onto the hull as efficiently as possible. Click on the picture to see an exploded view of a boats driveline.
 Once assembled the driveline parts will look like this. Once its mounted on the boat is will transfer the thrust generated by the propeller and move it to the boats transom.
Flexshaft soldering When assembling the flexshaft you should take the time to solder the cut end. There are several reasons for this. One is to keep it from unraveling on the cut end. Another is to minimize so called cable whip which is a vibration in the cable caused by the unsupported length between the flex hex coupling and the stuffing tube. A little solder stiffens the cable just enough to prevent whip. Lastly by stiffening the end of cable with solder it compresses less when tightening the flex hex, allowing a better grip.
You will find it is tough to get the solder to stick to the cable. First use flux, second fully heat up the cable and get a bead of solder started, then squeegee the solder into the cable windings with a towel. This helps force the solder into the cable grooves. Remove any excess buildup down to the level of the cable windings. Strut adjustments  The closer the strut is to the bottom of the boat the steeper the angle of attack on the sponsons and looser the front of the boat will run. If you bring it to far up the handling of the boat will become unpredictable and unstable. The reason to raise the strut is that it can make the boat faster because you have less sponson / hull in the water when on full plane. Additionally the increased angle of attack of the hull exposes more the hull bottom to the oncoming airflow which provides increased lift. Both of these result in the same thing, less water drag.Lowering the strut does the opposite of the above, it will lift the transom out of the water and decrease the hulls / sponson angle of attack. This will result in more hull being in contact with the water and reducing the amount of the hull bottom that is exposed to the airflow, reducing lift. When the water gets a bit rough this is what you are going to want to do. One way to think of these adjustments is to imagine the boat as a children's see-saw with the pivot point being the CG of the boat. Thinking in these terms it's easy see that when the transom is lowered the bow goes up, reducing the wet area. Strut angle adjustments  Changing the angle of the strut will effect the direction of the propellers thrust cone. This is another way to fine tune the way your boat is running. The strut has a positive angle when the prop shaft points upwards towards the water surface. In this situation, the transom is pressed down, you will get a large rooster tail and the engine RPM will increase a bit.
A negative angle occurs when the prop shaft points down, away from the water surface which raises the transom. In this situation you will get a smaller rooster tail and the engine rpm will decrease due to a larger bite of water on the propeller. You sometimes need to reduce the angle to allow the boat to get on plane. Generally a neutral angle is the ideal, it only takes a few degrees to significantly adjust the amount of wet area. | 
