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Gentlemanracer

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Been webbing around on holiday and imagineering next-boat maintenance. Volvo query, easy and done in a trice. Caterpillar? Not so fast. Who the heck services and supports these things? Yes, I know Finnings have a great rep, oil analysis blah, but what I cannot find is a service agent anywhere, but Solent would be a good start! Any guidance / recommendations from Cat owners very gratefully received!
 
Not sure what engines you have but I use Volvo Paul for the stuff I can't do myself, luckily mine being mechanical engines (not electronic) don't need specialist CAT equipment

Otherwise it's Finnings tho for specialist stuff and tappets which are every 250hours on mine
 
Well as this threads been born I will make a comment based around a conversation I had with a boat owner last week.

He was having a good old british rip off comment about finnings charges and customer attitude, he has a 3126 in his boat Solent based, he stated finnings wanted payment upfront , charged him over £300 travel from Poole to Chichester and nearly £2000 parts and labour on top of the travel costs to service his engine, on hearing this I think ill get some more training and leave the green engines in favour of yellow ones!! Can't get my breath over there charges, certainly worth considering an engine choice when buying new or re engining for the future budget. Ouch! Have you experienced this henryf?
 
I've found Cat official agent servicing in France remarkably good value - half the price I was expecting.

I don't know about UK. Alas the info you will get is going to be reduced by the fact that the heading on this thread is a bit daft and makes sense only after you've read the thread. It will not serve to attract Caterpillar engine owners; I stumbled across this in an insomniac-y moment
 
jfm said:
I've found Cat official agent servicing in France remarkably good value - half the price I was expecting.

I don't know about UK. Alas the info you will get is going to be reduced by the fact that the heading on this thread is a bit daft and makes sense only after you've read the thread. It will not serve to attract Caterpillar engine owners; I stumbled across this in an insomniac-y moment
Click to expand...


Thanks, JFM, some good news in there. I'm in holiday mode, back to normal formal next week so may re-post!
 
"He was having a good old british rip off comment about finnings charges and customer attitude, he has a 3126 in his boat Solent based, he stated finnings wanted payment upfront , charged him over £300 travel from Poole to Chichester and nearly £2000 parts and labour on top of the travel costs to service his engine" - Blimey !!! :(

Knew they were pricey but never realised that it was that much. I keep my boat in the Isle of Wight so I'm planning to take it over to Poole for Finning's to do their stuff.
 
Gentlemanracer said:
Cripes! The potential motors are C12's from 2004, so not ACERTs.
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C12 is a far more suitable engine for non franchised service techs to work on that 3126/C7

ACERT is just smoke and windows, makes no real difference to servicing.

Clones of CAT ET electronic service tooling available on the internet for around $600
 
Latestarter1 said:
C12 is a far more suitable engine for non franchised service techs to work on that 3126/C7

ACERT is just smoke and windows, makes no real difference to servicing.

Clones of CAT ET electronic service tooling available on the internet for around $600
Click to expand...

Much appreciated! Just looked at Caterpillar University link, so I'll see if I can get some basic service training from there, any experience / comments, maybe they are selling service tools??
 
Gentlemanracer said:
Much appreciated! Just looked at Caterpillar University link, so I'll see if I can get some basic service training from there, any experience / comments, maybe they are selling service tools??
Click to expand...

Genuine ET service tool only sold to certified Cat technicians who have completed the full training course. In addition you pay annual subscription. Cat ET clone package is one off payment and does not time out for five years and costs less than annual subscription.
 
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