What's considered to be too many engine hours?

Re: What\'s considered to be too many engine hours?

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I've been looking at a few Sealine 310s and Fairline Targas recently of around 1995 vintage and some seem to have very high engine hours e.g. 1400hrs. The engines are the likes of D3's and KAD32's and it's got me wondering if this is considered excessive. I'm only likely to put 80-100 hrs a year on them myself and the boats themselves are at a fair price. What do you guys think? Too high or do these engines 'go on forever'? (I'd obviously check their service records)

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And to answer the original question, there is no such thing as a leisure boat with "excessive hours". They all have very low hours, or even less.

Trying to compare a boat with 1,000 hours with one with 500 hours is like comparing a car with 4,000 miles to one with 2,000 miles. Yes one has half the mileage, but they're both very low in reality.

Worry about how they've been looked after more. Diesel engines like to be used.
 
Re: What\'s considered to be too many engine hours?

Corky,

People have a habit of comparing apples oranges and even bananas on this subject. Also never confuse reliability with durability.

The simple truth here is that modern marine base motors in pleasure boat applications, properly maintained never normally wear out, period.

It is the marine parts which suffer 'marine aging' which can be mitigated with proper maintainence and servicing. Engines can be driven to destruction by 'the nut behind the wheel' hammering an overloaded engine, but that is not durability.

If you break down engines into four categories you can get an understanding of POTENTIAL durability, even though not particularly relevant as I said in the beginning.

LDA (Light Duty Automotive) Class. Typically car/van derived high speed engines. Ford Transit, Mercedes Sprinter etc. Volvo D3, VM, marine engines fit into this category. All these modern engines are capable of AT LEAST 200,000 Kms durability.

Mid Range Class. Far heavier duty than LDA engines in terms of displacement and bearing area, typically around 1 litre per cylinder. Typical trucks DAF, IVECO trucks from 7.5 to 18 Tonnes. Engines Cummins B, QSB Series, Old and new Volvo D6, even though the new D6 has no applications other than marine, it meets the peramiters here. Typical MR engine durability is at least 1,000,000 Kms to overhaul.


Heavy Duty Mid Range Class. Typically 6.7 to 9 Litres, wet liner engines, operating in trucks and buses up to 26 Tonnes. Engines such a CAT C9, Cummins C, QSC Volvo D7. Typical HDMR life to overhaul 1,250,000 Kms.

Heavy Duty Class. Now he have the range of engines around two litres displacement node, Very large bearing areas, wet liners with base engine weighing at least 1 Tonne. Typical trucks Volvo FH12, Scania, up to 44 Tonnes.
Durability expectations to overhaul at least 1.5 Million Kms. Marine applications CAT C12, Cummins QSM11, and Volvo D12.
Most engines can be made to slot in the above categories or sub categories in between.

For commercial marine applications I believe that the best way of predicting life to overhaul is by the fuel burn method, not engine hours. For example if a certain 300 Hp marine engine runs for say 18,000 Hs and consumes X thousnd gallons to overhaul you can calculate the relationship between engine hours and fuel burned to predict how much longer the 250 Hp rating of the engine engine will live, or how much sooner the 350 Hp rating is likely to come up for overhaul.
 
Re: What\'s considered to be too many engine hours?

right with you on that. my first boat had very low hours and being green I was seduced by it. big mistake. the boat was nothing but trouble.
give me a boat that has been well used any day.
in any case this whole disccussion is based on a false premise because the OP's boat has only average hours anyway.
 
Re: What\'s considered to be too many engine hours?

You will get replies based on anothers misfortune, anothers gain ... both not relevant really - as it depends how the engines run.

Think of cars .......... a car that goes shopping every day and never gets properly run can be ruined in less than 100K miles. A salesmans car that is serviced and thrashed day in day out can run on and on well past that 100K and still give good service.

The question is like "How long is a piece of string".

IMHO - try the boat .. look for smoke, sh*t when engine starts .. does it produce good power from start or does it take ages to warm before any power ... is it a pig to start with sellers excuses about lack of running for weeks ????

I have an engine that was condemned by previous owner as past it's life ... I bought for peanuts and fitted. It needed a good thrash and use ... it sings like Singer Sewing machine now ... life expectancy ? Probably another 30 yrs considering it's 30 yrs old now ! and I trust it to take me across the Baltic.
 
Re: What\'s considered to be too many engine hours?

Our Sabre's were built in 1973, and have been going ever since, used every week end, we keep a log ours has counted 5000, but we have only had them since 1999, and before that who knows? they get regular services and will not give in, we have a pair of Mermaids 1974's waiting in the wings, but the Sabres just refuse to quit. As already stated "use them or lose them"
 
Re: What\'s considered to be too many engine hours?

"you being shown the door in no short order. "

Am now an expert on seeing doors slammed /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif, but with a little perseverance eventually you get yourself the right boat at the money you have to spend.
Unfortunately it does tend to leave a trail of outraged sellers in your wake.
/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
Re: What\'s considered to be too many engine hours?

Thank you everybody for your thoughts. It's certainly given me food for thought. I will take into account the starting difficulty, general condition of the engines and smoke emmisions when I sea trial. 2 of my crew are "mechanics" (one aviation engineer and one navy) and will be sure to give the engines the once over, but weren't familiar with what was 'normal' hour usage - hence the question.
Appreciate the advice everyone. Now I just need to find the money without SWMBO finding out !!
 
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