Replacing Bukh DV20 - full rebuild or light-refurb?

[Babylon]

I need to replace my Bukh DV20. The question is which option to go for:

Refurbished: £2,000 - £2,500 (head off, rings, gaskets, seals, prime & paint, etc).

Fully-rebuilt: £3,200 - £3,700 (full strip-down, rings, pistons & bores, re-machining if needed, eg crank, gaskets & seals, prime & paint, etc).

These price estimates are for engines delivered and old DV20 taken P/X (for rebuild or spares), but I wouldn't know EXACTLY what's been done to the replacement engine.

The other option is to go for a full-rebuild of my own 30yr old DV20 (stripped-down already, it looks like it needs it, probably involving remachining crank, etc), but this will take longer and the end-cost is as yet uncertain - could easily be well over £2,500 or more?

I intend to keep my boat (and keep renewing properly what needs dealing with, as budget allows) for the next few years at least; and intend to spend more time going longer distances coastal and offshore.

What does the esteemed panel consider? Go for more expensive 'piece-of-mind' or risk future problems with the cheaper options?

Thanks

Babs

PS One engine I've been offered (either as a light-refurb or a fairly-full rebuild) has a later gearbox - does anyone know when the DV20s started being fitted with the later gearbox? It would help to date the engine.

 

[RivalRedwing]

I would go for option B but the key question is who is doing the work... You need to have confidence in the work being done or you cash is wasted and you are half way to a new engine (see plenty of earlier threads).

 

[Kwik Decision]

Third option

An alternative would be a new 20 or 26 hp Beta or Nanni .

Cost (I enquired at SBS last year) is a little over £4k to buy, less what you get back when you sell your DV20 on e-bay. Therefore, assuming the figures you quote above don't include fitting, are not much higher than your complete re-build cost.

You get a new, more modern, 3 cylinder, smooth running, fresh water cooled, physically smaller engine, with 3 yr warrenty.

I've heard lots of good things on here about Beta, and when our DV20 needs expensive work (hope it isn't for a few years) this is the route we'll probably go down.....

 

[vyv_cox]

I agree with Moonfire. New rings in an engine that might well be 30 years old is almost throwing money away. Rebore, new pistons and rings is the minimum. I'm not sure if this engine has a hardened crankshaft, which may mean it doesn't need a regrind but will need bearings. Otherwise, regrind, main and big-end bearings. There are many additional bearings and bushes in this engine, for the counterweights, so ensure that all have been replaced.

It isn't incredibly difficult to do most of it yourself, only having the machining done by a specialist, although the Bukh is a long way from being the easiest engine to work on. You could consider contacting an experienced engine man, stripping it yourself with his occasional supervision, arranging the machining and then get him to rebuild it while you assist. Should keep costs down and you will learn a lot about engines. I found that a great deal of the time spent doing this job was undoing all the rusted nuts and bolts on the various covers. You don't want to be spending money on a skilled and expensive tradesman for this.

 

[Babylon]

I agree with Moonfire. New rings in an engine that might well be 30 years old is almost throwing money away. Rebore, new pistons and rings is the minimum. I'm not sure if this engine has a hardened crankshaft, which may mean it doesn't need a regrind but will need bearings. Otherwise, regrind, main and big-end bearings. There are many additional bearings and bushes in this engine, for the counterweights, so ensure that all have been replaced.

It isn't incredibly difficult to do most of it yourself, only having the machining done by a specialist, although the Bukh is a long way from being the easiest engine to work on. You could consider contacting an experienced engine man, stripping it yourself with his occasional supervision, arranging the machining and then get him to rebuild it while you assist. Should keep costs down and you will learn a lot about engines. I found that a great deal of the time spent doing this job was undoing all the rusted nuts and bolts on the various covers. You don't want to be spending money on a skilled and expensive tradesman for this.

Thanks Viv (and Moonfire) for the informed and valuable feedback.

I can do semi-skilled work myself, but don't have the advanced skills and especially the time right now, so I want to go with a specialist Bukh engineer I can trust to do the rebuild properly for me, or supply me with a fully-rebuilt engine and not a compromise.

My engine is already in bits: I'm only so far commited to the cost of a strip-down by a local non-Bukh engineer who, amongst some sucking of teeth, has now gone slow on me (probably hoping I'll order a new lightweight engine from him, but I can't afford the extra cost of a Beta-Yanmar-etc plus the time/cost of glassing-in new mounts and rearranging the entire engine bay).

I'll almost certainly go for the full-rebuild, but for the money (c £3,500) I will want reassurance that everything has been (or will be) thoroughly done. I plan to visit the alternative engineers, and checking against your list above will give me confidence in what they offer.

Babs

 

[vyv_cox]

I suggest you talk to Bukh UK. Everyone who deals with them is full of praise for their helpful advice. They will almost certainly advise your most economic option.

 

[Twister_Ken]

If you do get it done, I suggest you don't use the Bukh specialist in Southampton.

 

[waterbuffalo]

I was in a similar position last year

£6000 plus removal and fitting for a new Bukh 24 which would drop straight on to existing running gear. But still stuck with an old design 2 cylinder engine.

Or £6000 including fitting for a new Beta 20. Modern design and smoother running 3 cylinder engine.
(Fitting included removal of old engine, new folding prop, new exhaust hose and volvo seal)

I went for the Beta option and have noticed a consierable improvement in power, the engine itself is much quieter and smoother. No more annoying locker lid or cooker rattles.

 

[ali_g]

Hi Babylon,
Iam a self employed marine engineer in southampton area.
The last Bukh DV20 i rebuilt needed a new liner as it was burnt through at the head gasket joint but the crank was ok. I spoke to Bukh uk today, the parts are expensive
Complete piston £246 ea
Liner £181.38 ea
Piston ring set £65.40
Gasket/seal kit £357.15
Big end shells £55 per conrod.
ALL PLUS VAT.
As you can see the parts are not cheap and oversize pistons are not available from Bukh.
Other parts that will need to be serviced/overhauled include
Fuel injectors, Cyl head/valves, exhaust manifold/exhaust injection bend, engine mounts, waterpump.
Regards
ganter marine services

 

[30boat]

I would go for the new engine option.It'll cost you less in the short run.I had my own 25 year old Bukh rebuilt but in the end went for a Beta.If you keep the Bukh make sure the camshaft is keyed on to its gear.Mine wasn't(pre 1980) and it shifted throwing the timing out.Nobody could tell what was wrong with the engine as it would start normally but had no power.
The advance retard mechanism is a pig to reassemble .The crankshaft usually corrodes at the seal bearing area and leaks.Replace the raised hand start chain as when it breaks (mine did) it'll take the case with it.

 

[Jcorstorphine]

I went for a full rebuild

I need to replace my Bukh DV20. The question is which option to go for:

Refurbished: £2,000 - £2,500 (head off, rings, gaskets, seals, prime & paint, etc).

Fully-rebuilt: £3,200 - £3,700 (full strip-down, rings, pistons & bores, re-machining if needed, eg crank, gaskets & seals, prime & paint, etc).

These price estimates are for engines delivered and old DV20 taken P/X (for rebuild or spares), but I wouldn't know EXACTLY what's been done to the replacement engine.

I had a similar dilemma in deciding if I should rebuild or replace my Ford 1.6D engine. The cost of a new engine was about £4 to 5K plus all the bits I would need to change such as exhaust, teleflex, and so on plus all the work involved in altering the bearers prop shaft etc.

In the end, I decided on a rebuild of the bottom end in the hope I would get away with just rings, bearings and gaskets etc as all of the other parts of the engine were new (gearbox, heat exchanger, alternator starter etc and all the injection equipment and the cylinder head been reconditioned.

I was hoping for a cost of about £250 to £300 as Ford spares are a lot cheaper than Bukh or Volvo.

However, when I stripped the engine I found that the cylinder head (which had been fully reconditioned 12 months earlier by a supposed expert company) had a crack at two of the valves. The other problem was the bores were oval and it was touch and go as to whether new rings would bed in.

Result was that the cost was higher than I had hoped at just over £1,000

New Head £420
4 new Pistons £280
Rebore £120
New Bearings £130
Full gasket set £32
New Head Bolts £15
New water pump £7 (Ebay)

However, still a lot cheaper than a new engine. BUT I still have to hear it running as still too cold to go out to the garage to work on it.

The moral behind the above is that when you get down to measuring wear, ovality not to mention cracks and rust you may end up spending a lot more.

 

[Rafiki]

Babylon,

I have just been through similiar considerations. I had a DV20 circa 27 years old, working fine (well a bit slow to start in the cold and "steamed" a lot) I considered chnaging for a Nanni or Bukh 28 (I think) a couple of years ago and looked quite hard into it. What put me off was the definite feeling, no clear indication!, that once you start down the route of changing engines the costs build up as so many of the ancilliaries need to be changed. For example although Beta said their engine was just drop-in chnage with teh engine feet being in exactly teh same place as the Bukh it then transpired that teh engine was actualy shorter so I would need a new prop shaft and the engineer suggested a new prop as well.

I then looked at replacing the DV20 with a DV24 and that would genuinely be a like for like drop-in replacement since the bottom of the engine is exactly the same it is only the cylinder head and manifold that's different. However the cost of a Bukh 24 was so much more than a Beta - but as the guys at Bukh said they do last 30 plus years (usually!).

I decided eventually not to fret about the DV20 giving up the ghost and wait a few years until it does and in the meantime mentally think how much money I have "saved" and start actually doing some saving for a new one.

However in early November I saw a DV24 only! 12 years old and only! £2,500 for sale on Ebay. I bought it and have swapped it for the old DV20.

It genuinely was a drop-in replacement. I did most of the disconnections an dsome of the re-connections and spent a few hours dismantling a vital piece of woodwork to make the engine removal possible. I paid £690 for an engineer to do the swap-over (no parts needed) and that included VAT and £90 for crane hire. I used the old wiring loom as it simply plugs in place and wiring doesn't need to change. I then recovered £500 of that by selling my old engine sight unseen to an engineer/dealer ( who might be trying to sell it to you right now!).

There seems to be quite a demand for these old engines. Indeed the engineer I ised fro my work would have bought it for that price.

So overall my advice is to look at the realistic cost of replacement including all fitting costs and to realise that there seems to be an active market in the old engines.

Regards

 

[Babylon]

I have been through similiar considerations. I had a DV20 circa 27 years old... considered changing for a Nanni... what put me off was... that once you start down the route of changing engines the costs build up as so many of the ancilliaries need to be changed... so I would need a new prop shaft and the engineer suggested a new prop as well...I decided eventually not to fret about the DV20 giving up the ghost and wait a few years...

However in early November I saw a DV24 only! 12 years old and only! £2,500 for sale on Ebay. I bought it and have swapped it for the old DV20.

It genuinely was a drop-in replacement... I paid £690 for an engineer to do the swap-over ... I used the old wiring loom... then recovered £500 of that by selling my old engine sight unseen to an engineer/dealer ( who might be trying to sell it to you right now!).

So overall my advice is to look at the realistic cost of replacement including all fitting costs...

Gosh, that seems like a very good deal, and lucky timing too, especially for a much younger and more powerful DV24 that is literally just 'plug-and-play' in terms of fitting. Also useful to know that £500 seems to be the (non-p/x) value of old DV20s.

Having bought my boat 4yrs ago, I also decided to wait and see. However, eventually, serious oil-leak problems emerged last season when I started doing longer cruises, and the exploratory strip-down has revealed a host of other problems.

I'm loathe to go down the route of a completely new Nanni/Beta/Yanmar engine, with (as you rightly point out) the additional hassle and cost of major engine bay alterations and new shaft/gland/prop - especially as I fitted a new shaft/gland recently anyway! (The only marginal plus of a new 3-cylinder modern engine is its relative smoothness compared to the Bukh 2-cylinder thumpers.)

My instinct, bolstered by the majority of feedback on this thread, is to go for a fully-rebuilt DV20 (or have your luck and find a young DV24 for £2.5k!), but I do want to be sure that for the money I'm getting an engine that has been fully and properly sorted.

Cheers

Babs

 

[30boat]

Gosh, that seems like a very good deal, and lucky timing too, especially for a much younger and more powerful DV24 that is literally just 'plug-and-play' in terms of fitting. Also useful to know that £500 seems to be the (non-p/x) value of old DV20s.

Having bought my boat 4yrs ago, I also decided to wait and see. However, eventually, serious oil-leak problems emerged last season when I started doing longer cruises, and the exploratory strip-down has revealed a host of other problems.

I'm loathe to go down the route of a completely new Nanni/Beta/Yanmar engine, with (as you rightly point out) the additional hassle and cost of major engine bay alterations and new shaft/gland/prop - especially as I fitted a new shaft/gland recently anyway! (The only marginal plus of a new 3-cylinder modern engine is its relative smoothness compared to the Bukh 2-cylinder thumpers.)

My instinct, bolstered by the majority of feedback on this thread, is to go for a fully-rebuilt DV20 (or have your luck and find a young DV24 for £2.5k!), but I do want to be sure that for the money I'm getting an engine that has been fully and properly sorted.

Cheers

Babs

Last November I helped a friend replace his Bukh with a new Beta 25 wich has the same block as the 20.He retained the shaft and prop as did I when I went the same route .The new Beta was ordered with feet to match the existing Bukh installation and it worked well requiring only the drilling of two holes on the bearers for the new engine flexible mounts.The installation presented absolutely no problems and was carried out over a week with the boat on the slip and floating off at high tides.

 

[purplerobbie]

I was in a similar position last year

£6000 plus removal and fitting for a new Bukh 24 which would drop straight on to existing running gear. But still stuck with an old design 2 cylinder engine.

Or £6000 including fitting for a new Beta 20. Modern design and smoother running 3 cylinder engine.
(Fitting included removal of old engine, new folding prop, new exhaust hose and volvo seal)

I went for the Beta option and have noticed a consierable improvement in power, the engine itself is much quieter and smoother. No more annoying locker lid or cooker rattles.

I replaced a DV20 with a Beta 25 in 2009 the engine was about £4200 that included a tacho a high rise exhaust elbow, a centaflex coupling and delivery. New prop and shaft was £400.

(I don't know who gave you the price of £6000 for a new beta 20?)

I was quoted £6000ish for the new DV24 (they don't do a 20 now) which is a totally different engine and all the mounts are different. Apparently the feet are different on the early DV20 to the late one?

The mounts needed to moved 30mm in and 30mm down so it wasn't a big change.

Rob

 

[Babylon]

I replaced a DV20 with a Beta 25 in 2009 the engine was about £4200 that included a tacho a high rise exhaust elbow, a centaflex coupling and delivery. New prop and shaft was £400.

(I don't know who gave you the price of £6000 for a new beta 20?)

Rob

Rob

Today's rough quote from a Beta dealer/installer for a Beta 25:
engine £4k
labour £1-1.3k
other parts:
larger raw-water intake
new prop
?new shaft (unless move engine further back or fit a Beta 30 - too much HP)
?new throttle
?new strainer
?new syphon-break
?new exhaust-system

So, depending on exactly what can be kept, estimate total was £6.5-7k

But doing a lot of the donkey-work myself (and assuming that the morse throttle can be retained, the exhaust system fine - got a vetus anti-syphon thing already - etc, etc),
I can keep the total cost down to under £5k.

The Beta is certainly a very attractive option (for all reasons already stated) but my original budget was circa £3k. The jury is still out...

Cheers

Babs

 

[Paragon]

Hi Babs

I have re-engined two boats with beta engines and have no hesitation in recommending this route. You know where you are with a new engine, especially if you are thinking of going further afield, and the smoothness and quietness will also help.

It looks from your picture like you have a V27, like me, and when my DV20 needs major money I will definitely change for a Beta 20/25. Have a look at the Vancouver club forum as it's been done before with great sucess and you may not have to change much more than just the engine either!

Good luck with it anyway!

Regards

John

 

[Babylon]

Beta 25

Hi John

Thanks for your input here (and thanks 30boat also for all your Beta recommendations!) - the Beta is looking more and more attractive, especially as I reckon I can do almost all of the engine-bay conversion work myself and source parts directly, rather than pay a dealer a marked-up parts and labour price to fit one for me.

Yes, there's a very good pictorial link via the Vancouver forum to Caretta, a V27 which the owner re-engined two or three years ago with a Beta. See:http://www.bangor.ac.uk/~oss059/Caretta/engine.html

Babs

 

[Poignard]

I completely overhauled and rebuilt my BUKH DV10 engine several years ago, fitting new bearings, liner, piston, valves, valve springs, valve seats and guides, etc.

The cost of the parts came to more than £1200 but the labour (i.e. mine) was free. I had the skills to do it and it would have cost too much to pay someone else to do it even if I had been able to find someone I could trust.

Otherwise I would have fitted either a new Yanmar IGM10 or a Beta.

 

[Babylon]

Work the boat or work the business to pay for the boat?

... The cost of the parts came to more than £1200 but the labour (i.e. mine) was free. I had the skills to do it and it would have cost too much to pay someone else to do it even if I had been able to find someone I could trust....

Absolutely. Small yacht work distills down to the three elements to which you refer: skills, time and trust.

Engine work in particular is a skill a lot of owners lack, so there are engineers out there ready (quite rightly) to make a living out of doing it on customers' behalf. But there are also so-called professionals who (quite wrongly) mask what really needs doing or cut certain corners, so when the thing goes bang they (think they) can sell you a new engine. This is an abuse of trust.

But time is the real variable. Michael Ignatieff put it nicely in the late 80's: "The rich spend money to save time, while the poor spend time to save money." For those who are self-employed, its a finely-balanced question: can one make more money working the business to pay for the boat work, or save money by learning how to do boat work oneself at the expense of one's business? The answer is that, if the money-equation is deemed equal, boat work is more satisfying!

But into the mix is an additional pressure (especially for those still in full-time work and with high-maintenance families to attend to): time for the boat is a precious commodity!

Best

Babs