Perkins Diesels

I saw a boat for sale with Perkins diesels. I love the boat but am nervous about Perkins. Not likely I’ll move forward on the boat due to personal timing, but want to be less leery.

Oh, and I am cheap.

What I have heard-
Ancient
No parts any more
Parts available must come from the UK ( I’m in the US)

My good boat buddy Tom on here is a mechanical whiz, but sold it. Anyone with a Perkins currently able to comment? Any idiosyncrasies? Any difficulty ordering parts in the US?
Thanks
Ben

I had no problem finding/buying Perkins parts. If you have not owned diesels up till now most all diesel parts will appear expensive - no matter what color engine you have.
Does this Perkins engine have a year and model to get more accurate answers?

So far, so good with respect to parts for our 1984 6.3544s. All mechanical, no electronics save for a few readily-available relays. Supply problems with some of the replacement hoses, but automotive stuff is available. Lots of 'em are still around.

Perkins was used all over the US and North America. Most all parts for the engine are still available. The marinized side should still have good parts supply as well. Several companies still make marine parts for them if I'm not mistaken. They seem to be a popular choice for older lower powered diesel.

Love my twin Perkins 4.236s (naturals) and wouldn't hesitate to buy another boat with Perkins. No issues with parts availability or cost.

My friend's Cat 3208s needed risers. His cost was $4500 for all 4 riser on both engines. Mine cost well under $1000 for the same job on my twins.

Parts for the Perkins T6.354 in our boat have been never been a problem to source nor have they been more expensive than other comparable diesels. I wouldn't hesitate to purchase any vessel powered by Perkins after a complete positive engine survey.

I would recommend the Perkins diesels. They are used in tractors all over the US and many parts cross over and are much cheaper through farm supply houses.

I still like my 6.354 na . Mine is a rebuild from Trans Atlantic Diesel . 1500 hrs on OldBlue

The turbo/aftercooled 6.354's up at 200hp and above use a multi-cooler for coolant and charge air that is prone to corrosion and very difficult to source if replacement is needed. I would be very cautious of a TA high hp unit.

Non-turbo and turbo with no aftercooler, good machines.

Some twin engine boats use a reverse rotation engine, those can be a pita to source parts. Make sure both engines spin the same way.

Single 135 hp non turbo. No issues. Simple mechanical injection system. I would replace with same when the time comes.
These engine are used in Massey Fergeson tractors. Just about any tractor mechanic can fix.

I had a pair of 1973, 4-236 in our old Gulfstar. Great engines, easy to work on, reliable, economical. I did have a parts issue with the coolant tank and had to get one from England, that was pretty expensive. Other than that, parts were readily available.


The only negative I have to offer on Perkins is that they leak fuel and oil a lot. It's called the "Perkins Patina" only partly in jest. Put a lot of fuel diapers in the budget.

Again I say sign me up fur a Perk.


I'll also accept a Furd Lemon. :lol:
I kid I kid. The Lehman is next to Perkins in reliability and parts availability I think.

Ours (6-354) is fine. It starts & runs like a top, burns zero oil, very economical fuel burn and best of all, it's a simple diesel & easy to work on when it does need repair. Like Ski mentioned, the clockwise engines are not as common (the original purchaser of our boat must've drawn a short straw because that's what we have...a right-hand one) but so far I've had no trouble sourcing the major parts I've needed (starter & circulating pump) from TAD in Gloucester,Virginia.

Hi All
Thanks for the volume and enthusiasm of the responses. With my old Lehman I had been used to easily obtainable parts typically from American Diesel. Good to know I can shop Perkins powered boats with confidence.

There were 20,000hrs. on my Perkins HT6-354 when I rebuilt it. It has since been to Bahamas twice and Honduras twice from Toronto. I buy all my parts at Farm equipment dealers since they are subsidized and don't have the dreaded "marine" markup. 6-354's in all their versions are all over North America as farm equipment and generator engines.

If anyone has any parts issues with Perkins engine you can buy full rebuild kits from the OE manufacturers www.parts4engines.com for very economical prices.
boatpoker is correct when he says Perkins engines power Massey Ferguson tractors, forklifts, diggers, many JCB models and generators so there's no problem getting parts anywhere in the world.
For marinization parts the OE manufacturers are E.J Bowman of Birmingham. Great Britain and can be found at www.ejbowman.co.uk.

Either of these companies will of course naturally ship worldwide.
If you want economical shipping of parts from the UK (or to/from other parts of the world then use www.sendmybag.com.

As for some who say that Perkins are prone to leaks and to put plenty of diapers below them I would respectfully point out that its not true. There's a technical reason for any leak and a 'wet' engine is a sign of poor maintenance.
In short and no offence meant, fix it.

I've used Perkins engines right from the early P6's in farm machinery (and many other marks since) but have always had great service, reliability and longevity from Perkins.

Incidentally if anyone has to fit shell/main bearings during rebuild make sure that they are fresh stock as the later 'lead free' bearings have twice the life.
Don't be caught with someone offloading old stock.
I hope this is helpful to someone.

We almost didn't buy our boat because the starboard engine is contra-rotating and one of the major Perkins parts suppliers told us that parts for it no longer existed. They said to run away. I then got a second opinion from Trans Atlantic Diesel and learned that Perkins, for some reason, gave all parts on the reverse rotation engines different part numbers. Only about six unlikely to fail parts are different. Just look up the normal engine's part number and use it.


We love our 1975 Perkins 6.354's. I would consider Perkins a plus if I was looking for another older trawler as long as they were not turbo.

Roger Long said:

We almost didn't buy our boat because the starboard engine is contra-rotating and one of the major Perkins parts suppliers told us that parts for it no longer existed. They said to run away. I then got a second opinion from Trans Atlantic Diesel and learned that Perkins, for some reason, gave all parts on the reverse rotation engines different part numbers. Only about six unlikely to fail parts are different. Just look up the normal engine's part number and use it.


We love our 1975 Perkins 6.354's. I would consider Perkins a plus if I was looking for another older trawler as long as they were not turbo.

Click to expand...

My turbo was rebuilt at 20,000hrs. on my HT6-354

Irish Rambler said:

If anyone has any parts issues with Perkins engine you can buy full rebuild kits from the OE manufacturers www.parts4engines.com for very economical prices.
boatpoker is correct when he says Perkins engines power Massey Ferguson tractors, forklifts, diggers, many JCB models and generators so there's no problem getting parts anywhere in the world.
For marinization parts the OE manufacturers are E.J Bowman of Birmingham. Great Britain and can be found at www.ejbowman.co.uk.

Either of these companies will of course naturally ship worldwide.
If you want economical shipping of parts from the UK (or to/from other parts of the world then use www.sendmybag.com.

As for some who say that Perkins are prone to leaks and to put plenty of diapers below them I would respectfully point out that its not true. There's a technical reason for any leak and a 'wet' engine is a sign of poor maintenance.
In short and no offence meant, fix it.

I've used Perkins engines right from the early P6's in farm machinery (and many other marks since) but have always had great service, reliability and longevity from Perkins.

Incidentally if anyone has to fit shell/main bearings during rebuild make sure that they are fresh stock as the later 'lead free' bearings have twice the life.
Don't be caught with someone offloading old stock.
I hope this is helpful to someone.

Click to expand...

Yes and thanks. Very informative post.

To the OP, don't get me wrong. If I had a choice of what engine we had, a 40 yo Perkins wouldn't be the 1st one. I would much rather have had a Cummins or Deere or a host of later model engines but since we were pretty much firm on the kind of boat we wanted, we couldn't be to picky about the propulsion. So far, the turbo has not been a problem (knock on wood) and the heat exchanger isn't a manicooler style so we're good. My main gripe is the salt-water cooled iron exhaust manifold and after cooler. IMO it's a dumb design but ours was always a upper bay boat which was brackish to fresh water so they've lasted until recently. I've bypassed the aftercooler that got a pinhole in it because we cruise at a low RPM anyway & the exhaust gas temp doesn't get high. I'm not sure if I'll replace it or not. The exhaust manifold is another story. We're running on borrowed time with that ,so it will be replaced soon. When it does, I'll probably modify the plumbing so that it's incorporated into the closed loop freshwater circuit. Again, we don't push the engine hard for long stretches so overheating isn't an issue.
Therein is the dilemma. Is it prudent to spend $7-800 for an aftercooler housing & another $8-900 for an exhaust manifold (parts only) to keep a 40 year old engine going? That's almost 2 grand that would be a good start towards a later model engine. For us, it's the easy route to keep bolting on the new parts as long as the core engine is running so well.

Roger Long said:

We almost didn't buy our boat because the starboard engine is contra-rotating and one of the major Perkins parts suppliers told us that parts for it no longer existed. They said to run away. I then got a second opinion from Trans Atlantic Diesel and learned that Perkins, for some reason, gave all parts on the reverse rotation engines different part numbers. Only about six unlikely to fail parts are different. Just look up the normal engine's part number and use it.


We love our 1975 Perkins 6.354's. I would consider Perkins a plus if I was looking for another older trawler as long as they were not turbo.

Click to expand...

Good info. I figured there was more to it than every part being different. Strange how Perk did that to mess with people's minds.

boomerang said:

To the OP, don't get me wrong. If I had a choice of what engine we had, a 40 yo Perkins wouldn't be the 1st one. I would much rather have had a Cummins or Deere or a host of later model engines but since we were pretty much firm on the kind of boat we wanted, we couldn't be to picky about the propulsion. So far, the turbo has not been a problem (knock on wood) and the heat exchanger isn't a manicooler style so we're good. My main gripe is the salt-water cooled iron exhaust manifold and after cooler. IMO it's a dumb design but ours was always a upper bay boat which was brackish to fresh water so they've lasted until recently. I've bypassed the aftercooler that got a pinhole in it because we cruise at a low RPM anyway & the exhaust gas temp doesn't get high. I'm not sure if I'll replace it or not. The exhaust manifold is another story. We're running on borrowed time with that ,so it will be replaced soon. When it does, I'll probably modify the plumbing so that it's incorporated into the closed loop freshwater circuit. Again, we don't push the engine hard for long stretches so overheating isn't an issue.
Therein is the dilemma. Is it prudent to spend $7-800 for an aftercooler housing & another $8-900 for an exhaust manifold (parts only) to keep a 40 year old engine going? That's almost 2 grand that would be a good start towards a later model engine. For us, it's the easy route to keep bolting on the new parts as long as the core engine is running so well.

Click to expand...

If one can be choosy, I agree, Deere or Cummins all the way.

Everyone has their favourites and who are we to dispute their choice, but it can appear to be confusing for the nontechnical.We all have horror stories of some individual engine but these a not to be taken as gospel because we rarely hear the full unexpurgated story.

A little bit of background to clear up the confusion over engine rotation.
Perkins took over Rolls-Royce diesels at Crewe in England where I served some time on secondment from the army on R&D.
When Rolls had an engine block cast it had the unique feature of the working parts being able to be fitted to run either l/h or r/h rotation from either end of the block. They were the only engine to be painted inside which was to stop any little bits of the casting sand embedded in the cast coming loose and causing any damage.
The reason for the option of l/h or r/h rotation was because when fitting the Rolls diesels in military vehicles many were not fitted in conventional layouts, generally because the need for low profile armour, consequently it wasn't always possible to get a gearbox to suit and it was therefore easier to change the rotation of the engine.
In the marine world many gearboxes offered only one choice of rotation 'off the shelf', in those circumstances to get contra rotating props on a twin it was far easier to fit engines with different rotations. As you have found out already there are very few parts that are different despite having different part numbers so there's no need to be afraid as long as you mark the engine rotation clearly to avoid any confusion.

You may be surprised that one such engine block originally designed by Rolls-Royce to run left right or end over was the Rolls-Royce 'Eagle' diesel engine which originally came in either 265 or 290 hp, when Perkins took over Rolls they simply gave its output in their brochures, later Caterpillar took over Perkins and that same block tweaked a bit here and there, mostly around the head is now called the Caterpillar C19 engine.

IR

Great insights.

As an aside, much of this thread is devoted to Perkins marine diesels from a few generations ago. Today's Perkins Sabres are emissions compliant, long absent the dreaded manicooler and a compact 4 or 6 cylinder unit in the 90 to 300 HP range.

Hundreds of thousands of Perkins non marine diesels are made every year carrying the badges of various "builders." About 60 years ago Massey Ferguson owned Perkins, then went to Lucas and finally Cat for the past 20 years.

sunchaser said:

IR

Great insights.

As an aside, much of this thread is devoted to Perkins marine diesels from a few generations ago. Today's Perkins Sabres are emissions compliant, long absent the dreaded manicooler and a compact 4 or 6 cylinder unit in the 90 to 300 HP range.

Hundreds of thousands of Perkins non marine diesels are made every year carrying the badges of various "builders." About 60 years ago Massey Ferguson owned Perkins, then went to Lucas and finally Cat for the past 20 years.

Click to expand...

Yes ,Mine has the manicooler and I'm sure it's just a short matter of time before having to replace it.

boatpoker said:

There were 20,000hrs. on my Perkins HT6-354 when I rebuilt it. It has since been to Bahamas twice and Honduras twice from Toronto. I buy all my parts at Farm equipment dealers since they are subsidized and don't have the dreaded "marine" markup. 6-354's in all their versions are all over North America as farm equipment and generator engines.

Click to expand...

New fuel injector pump for 4-236 at marine cost around $2,000.00 or more:
https://shop.perkins.com/parts/fuel-systems/fuel-pumps/fuel-injection-pumps

I found my replacement in a similar site as this:
Ford/New Holland Injection Pumps

The difference between the two comparables,was found after I purchased and installed. The original pump on the engine was rated at 3800 RPM. the replacement tractor pump is rated to 2200 RPM. So I am restricted for achieving the rated RPM of the engine.
Am I concerned? Heck no- As our engine is overproped with a maximum RPM of 2400 RPM and we run at 1600 RPM the fact that the fuel is restricted is of no consequence. The price difference is unbelievable.
In asking why the price of our replacement pump is in the $500-600 dollar range when seeing the marine versions at the higher cost, I was informed that the supplier built their pumps new, in Poland.
With the reputation of classic machine works of Poland, I was further impressed.

Al-Ketchikan

Sunchaser, some of those other 'marque's' you mentioned are Case, David Brown and small Volvo's up to 40 hp.
Among diesel aficionados' in the UK the Perkins 6354 and its smaller brother the 4236 (the both use the same pistons, liners etc) are regarded as the benchmark of diesels.
There are tweaks on later variants (not strictly necessary for a marine engine) to make them emissions compliant. Agricultural suppliers usually have their own engineering shop suppliers for overhauling pumps and injectors and if they are given the engines use and parameters can set up the pump to suit.

Most marine diesels are supplied with a simple coarse wire gauze intake filter, if you take away that gauze filter and get a female aluminium adapter made to fit over the male engine intake with a small engine breather pipe welded into it, then fit some plastic non collapsible pipe and route it well away from the engine to a paper element air cleaner you will find that it cuts the engine noise by 15/20%.
You will also be surprised when you change the filter (once a year) how much dust/dirt it stops and this also is a factor towards a long engine life.

Its 4 am as I write this and if my explanation is not clear I'll lift the floorboards later when the admirals up out of bed and post a photo for you.

OK the admirals up and the floorboards have been up and here are some photo's of the air cleaner modification and fuel pump spin on filter head conversion with built in priming pump that are I've fitted to my own boat.
A bit of dust you can see around the engine disproves earlier claims of oily Perkins engines.

Photo's 1&2.
The air filter mod.
You can see on the air intake where the old wire gauze filter was removed and the metal elbow made to replace it. I made it in aluminium with 4 slots cut into the male fitting so the large jubilee can clamp the female fitting airtight onto the intake manifold.
The engine breather uses the same short piece of rubber hose.
The hose leading away from the bottom of the mod is a wire reinforced (to stop it collapsing under vacuum) heat resistant flexible plastic and is routed to an air filter housing. I purchased a complete air filter housing from a scrapyard making sure it was suitable for a 3 litre engine so my 4236 would have sufficient flow. You can mount this filter body anywhere well away from the engine preferably near a vent to draw in clean air. This will cut down between 15 and 20 % of engine noise and ensure a clean supply of air to your engine.

Photo's.
3,4,5,6.
I always found CAV sandwich filters found on Perkins and Fords messy and a PITA, so when these conversion heads came on the market incorporating a heel of your hand pump I was right in there converting our engines.
You simply unbolt the old head, bolt on the replacement using the same mounting bolts.
You will need 3 extra banjo bolts and copper washers to refit the new filter head.
If you look closely at the bottom of the hand pump you can see the longer banjo bolt in pics 5 &number 6. 6.

To help you with links and part numbers I emailed my suppliers this morning and posted his reply is in photo/Snip below photo's.

If you're changing a fuel filter using the spin-on conversion head the method is as follows.

1, Start the engine and run it until just warm.( It helps starting again after the filter change).

2, Remove the old spin-on filter with suitable absorbent rags/plastic bag to catch any fuel spills/drips.

3, Fill the new spin-on filter full to the brim with fuel, wet the rubber sealing ring with fuel, carefully replace the full spin-on filter and hand tighten only.

4, Clean the area thoroughly of any spills/drips.

5, Start the engine on and run about 800 rpm, as soon as the engine is running, quickly pump the button on top of the filter housing until the engine runs smoothly.
With a bit of practice you'll never need to bleed the engine again when changing fuel filters.

6, Now give a good squirt of lemon scented washing up liquid into your bilge, this will emulsify any oil droplets in the bilge and be acceptable for pumping over board as well as killing any smell of diesel caused during your fuel change.

I hope you find this helpful to stress free filter changes.

https://www.popyachts.com/trawlers-...ruiser-cc-36-005-in-harrison-tennessee-155523

The engines that inspired my original post are the Perkins 4.236’s in this Prairie trawler here. We had a 36 MT Sundeck for 7 years with a Ford Lehman. I loved the Lehman and learned on it. It is a simple motor. With this boat linked, I like the idea of twin four-bangers. Allows redundancy and low fuel consumption because my notion is to go far and consume lightly.

Ben said:

https://www.popyachts.com/trawlers-...ruiser-cc-36-005-in-harrison-tennessee-155523

The engines that inspired my original post are the Perkins 4.236’s in this Prairie trawler here. We had a 36 MT Sundeck for 7 years with a Ford Lehman. I loved the Lehman and learned on it. It is a simple motor. With this boat linked, I like the idea of twin four-bangers. Allows redundancy and low fuel consumption because my notion is to go far and consume lightly.

Click to expand...

That's my idea but I am comfortable with a single diesel of known quality and good maintenace records.