Albin 43 depower

Hi. I am looking at purchasing a fully restored Albin 43 Sundeck. It is fitted with twin Yanmar 370hp engines which are getting a bit tired. 8 knot cruise is fine for me so the repower I am considering is the FPT/Iveco N45 100hp.
Much obliged for any input.

....and the boat currently has no autopilot so would the Raymarine EV100 Wheel Pilot work OK as a retrofit?

Welcome aboard. Nice looking boat. Are the Yanmars too tired to run the boat at 8 knots? Because if they will still run it would be way more economical to put a bit of work into them rather than repower with a different engine. When you change to a different engine, everything changes and costs go up rapidly. Good luck.

Rosco2018 said:

....and the boat currently has no autopilot so would the Raymarine EV100 Wheel Pilot work OK as a retrofit?

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Don’t know much about that particular autopilot but Raymarines are getting good reviews. But that is one place I would not cut corners, they work too much of the time to be undersized.

I don't think the wheel pilot will handle a boat with that displacement. Maybe about half. I think you'll want a traditional drive system.


2x100 horses isn't too far from the 2x120hp to 2x135hp that are often seen on similar boats. And, they usually can cruise at about 9 knots, more limited by climbing the hill above hull speed than by hp in some ways of thinking.

Making some really rough guesses based upon some generic trawler that size....
-- With a water line of roughly 38ft, hull speed will be roughly 8kn, right around your desired cruise speed
-- Displacement of about 32,000lbs
-- Making wild estimation about how I've seen boats run with similar hull shapes, etc.
-- Probably needs 40hp to maintain that hull speed, if that, even accounting for a less than perfect real world, water, gear, etc.
-- Add in few hp to drive the alternators, lets say 2.5hp, each (about 60 amp output, each...1hp/25A)
-- That puts us somewhere in the range of 42-43hp to maintain hull speed.
-- If, at most, you want to run engines at 80% hp (hp != rpm, 80% hp likely developed < 80%rpm) for cruise, that puts you at needing 50-55hp each engine.

So...under the assumptions above, you'll be fine with 100hp/engine. No problem. Not even close.

Of course, if you want to start to climb the hill above that hull speed...your need for hp will go up really fast. So, climbing the hill, a 20-35% difference in HP won't nearly make that much difference in speed. Less than half of that, probably.

All of this is just me really wildly guessing, without doing any math, or looking back at any records.

The upshot is....my take is you'll do plenty fine with 200hp available....but need to get a traditional autopilot drive.

BTW, I'd agree with Comodave. Unless something more than "tired" is going on...I wouldn't spend all sorts of crazy money to repower.

Also, what year is the boat? What specific model are the engines? What year are the engines? I thought those boats normally had 135hp Lehmans or 210hp Cummings. Has it already been repowered once?

Somehow I missed that this boat currently has 2x375 hp engines. That is really unusual, at least for the boat's I've seen.

And, I can't say it makes a lot of sense. Looking at the photo, that is the same semi-displacement hull I've always seen on that boat. It isn't a planing hull. Letting hundreds of hp loose will be mostly trying to push the ocean while tilting up relatively little. Maybe with that kind of hp available it cruises at 16 knots or something. Maybe. And, now we are defining cruise speed as a reasonable RPM for the engines and reasonable handling of the boat vs some point on the fuel-economy/speed curve.

We THINK that it is one of the last Albin 43 Sundeck to be made, around 1994. It then sat in the yard in Taiwan without engines until a Yanmar dealer bought it in 2006 and decided to make a demo boat out of it and installed 370hp Yanmar 6LYA-STP engines.
THEN, about 10 years ago, the entire interior woodwork was eaten by white ants or termites or something. A local boatyard then bought the boat from the insurance company and entirely rebuilt the interior to a very high standard, including adding a sliding glass door from the salon to the aft deck.

Hi Rosco,

Okay. So that explains the unusual engines.

So, it is a 2006 engine that was out of use by 2013...7 years in service.

Depending upon how many hours it has on it, and how it was stored during those 6 years....it could still be a very good engine. Of course, it could be a rusted block of metal, too.

How many hours do they have? In what ways are they tired?

Those are nice engines that were top-of-the-line for a while. I'd hate to throw them away, if they are good (or can be made good).

If you like the boat, yes to th Iveco/FPT engines, no to that cheezy wheel pilot. Can The Yanmars be rebuilt for less money than a repower?

Thanks for the input. We'll know more after the sea trial.

Were the termites successfully exterminated? Did they damage core? Ant or termite infested boats can suffer from unseen ramifications.

Be sure exhaust system is designed correctly. This seemingly unimportant issue is a cause of many premature engine failures.

The wheel pilots are made for sailboats that usually have a larger rudder and require more effort to turn.

On boats with mechanical steering that is in OK condition I have never yet seen one that the sailboat units did not do a good job on.

Sailboats are more likely to operate 24/7 so their reliability is good.

The install is fast and easy.


"which are getting a bit tired."


Over 5,000 hours? Hard starting? smokes when warm? What is tired?

FF said:

The wheel pilots are made for sailboats that usually have a larger rudder and require more effort to turn.


On boats with mechanical steering that is in OK condition I have never yet seen one that the sailboat units did not do a good job on.


Sailboats are more likely to operate 24/7 so their reliability is good.

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25 years ago, I learned a lot about how AP software and firmware operates. I had replaced cable steering with hydraulic on my Willard 30 and installed a base model Navico hydraulic pilot designed for a boat well within the specs of my 17k lb W30. I couldn't get it to steer a straight line (serpentine) . I spent a lot of time staring at the rudder post to understand what was going on - its response needed to slow down, just wait a little longer. Navico was no help so I reached out to West Marine where I met Chuck Hawley, their BP of customer service and product selection , the guy who used to write the "Advisor" posts in their catalog. He went to bat for me and told Navico "you know, this guy seems like he's on to something here...." Navico sent their top model as a beta test. Worked fine.

My point being that APs are not all interchangeable. The wheel pilot might work fine on this boat. Or it might not. You literally won't know until it's installed - highly unlikely you'll find a similar install to compare beforehand. But if there is precedent, this list is the place to find it.

I'm definitely curious about the metric of "tired" for the engines. They might be easy to save depending on what's going on.

Those engines should not be "tired" given their short working history. We definitely need your definition of "tired". If it is not attaining WOT top rpm it could be a prop issue, if it is rough running or smoking it might be fuel or injectors.

Give us more engine information.

As for the Wheel Autopilot. Not a good match. Not enough power for about that size boat, it would work itself to death in a very short time. Also they are noisy.

pete

If you REALLY like the boat and want to be buried in it, OR if you REALLY like the boat and are funded enough to take a haircut when the next pretty girl walks by.... by all means, repower.

If none of those apply AND the cost of keeping these waaaay too large engines going is too high.... walk, no RUN away.

The pretty interior is going to lose it's luster pretty quickly when the decimal starts dancing to starboard.

How many hours are on the engines? I would have them surveyed by a yanmar certified technician. Are you loosing compression? burning oil? leaking? Not making rpm's?

If you intend on repowering, then bank the cash and wait until it actually NEEDS a repower. Short of facts, this sounds like a misguided WANT, not a NEED.

Gotta agree with those who say that it would probably be cheaper and quicker to revive the existing engines. And even if those big engines use a little bit more fuel than smaller engines would, the difference would take decades to break even on the cost of a total re-power.



That said, 740hp worth of engines is pretty absurd for that boat. You're not going to be water skiing behind an Albin 43! The very biggest engines they normally came with were two 210hp Cummins. Even that is way more than necessary. A single 120hp Lehman would get it to hull speed in 99% of the conditions you would ever see.


So, if you REALLY want to put new engines in it, then I agree completely with the idea of two engines in the 100hp range each.


Good luck, whatever you do.

I owned two of the Yanmar 6LY 370s in my last two boats. There is a very easy test for "tired". While on your sea trial underway at about 2,000 rpm, hold your hand in front of the black hose on the starboard side of each engine that terminates above the air filter element. If you feel significant pulses, it is tired. If you just feel light pulses or usually none, it still has a lot of life in it. You are measuring blowby by using what TFer Ski calls a redneck blowby test.

If the engines pass that test, then everything else is external to the block and can be replaced a lot cheaper than repoweriing.


Also if you want to go slow, that engine will handle slow fine at 1,500 or so rpm and will burn about the same fuel as a similar displacement Lehman or Perkins 135.


David

Thanks all for the input. I've about tripled my knowledge of this style of boat in less than 12 hours. I'm a lifelong sailor but I want to make the jump to a Trawler. Lots to consider.

I'd rather have a Yanmar mechanic make that determination.

I’ve always been a supporter of powering down.
But powering down may not make economic sense.
But a boat old boat dosn’t have much to loose. With a newer boat powering down would probably affect the resale value.
But if one wants a slow boat why not buy a slow boat that’s actually good at going slow. Meaning of course a full displacement hulled boat. Not as easy to find but when you do they aren’t more expensive.
But most of us wanna buy when we wanna buy.

But buying new engines would actually be stupid if the old ones were in good shape. But sometimes we do stupid things to get what we want.
I may be wrong but it looks like the OP being a sailboat skipper before may be looking for the best space per buck. You’d probably need a 50’+ FD boat to get the space aboard this big old Albin.

Along what Nomad Willy is saying, to me, assuming the current engines can be made serviceable easily enough, the decision would come to a few things: how fast can the boat cruise without beating the snot out of the current engines? How is the fuel efficiency at low and high speed? How does the hull handle at high speed?

If the boat is good enough at going fast, the engines are fine with the light load of going slow and efficiency at low speed is good enough that there's not a ton to gain by going to smaller engines, it makes sense in my mind to keep the ability to go fast even if you don't do it often.

Yanmar 6LYs are fairly small displacement (smaller than an FL120), so efficiency at lower speeds is likely to be pretty good. I doubt there's much to gain by swapping them with a lower power naturally aspirated engine. An even smaller displacement turbo engine would likely gain a little efficiency at low boat speeds though.

I'm "guessing" that this hull is similar to the 42 ft LeBelle trawlers that come with twin 225 Lehmans. That boat does fine both at slow speed and on plane from what I've read. There was one at my marina a few years ago and he mostly ran at 8 knots but occasionally would crank it up. I vaguely remember him saying 14 to 15 knts was doable.
I would think those Yanmars would be fine in that boat if they are still serviceable.

rslifkin said:

Yanmar 6LYs are fairly small displacement (smaller than an FL120), so efficiency at lower speeds is likely to be pretty good. I doubt there's much to gain by swapping them with a lower power naturally aspirated engine. An even smaller displacement turbo engine would likely gain a little efficiency at low boat speeds though.

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Yes, this point has been debated on a dozen or more different threads here over the years.

The Yanmar has 5.3 liters of displacement and the Lehman or Perkins has 5.8 liters. Low speed efficiency is directly related to displacement. Large displacement means it takes more parasitic energy to turn the crank, oil and injector pump, R/W pump, etc. before sending any to the output shaft. A highly turbo charged engine like the Yanmar 370 doesn't use any more parasitic energy than the older Lehman or Perkins at the same rpms.

So the low speed efficiency will be the same. Therefore if the engines can be restored from whatever "tired" state they are in, at reasonable cost, there is no benefit to repowering and a lot of downsides.

David

The motors in my boat are approaching 60 years old, I think they are tired but they still run good and burn minimal oil. Outside of normal maintenance the only repair that has been done is a valve job on one of them, well and a rebuilt carborator also. I carefully nurse them along and they start and run great. they are gasoline, Palmer conversions of International Black Diamond 6 bangers. I dont ever plan to replace them unless they blow up or just totally wear out....

Bill,
Being I H and Palmer they are probably overhead valves.
Very good engines as FF will attest to.

So the engines in your boat are 60yrs old .. how old is the boat and what is it? Mathews perhaps? Monk? .....

jleonard said:

I'm "guessing" that this hull is similar to the 42 ft LeBelle trawlers that come with twin 225 Lehmans. That boat does fine both at slow speed and on plane from what I've read. There was one at my marina a few years ago and he mostly ran at 8 knots but occasionally would crank it up. I vaguely remember him saying 14 to 15 knts was doable.
I would think those Yanmars would be fine in that boat if they are still serviceable.

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We have a 41’ President with SP225 Lehmans. On the sea trial we got 17 knots at WOT. However we always run at about 1600 RPM and get 9 knots. I am currently in the process of detuning them to 180 hp by bypassing the intercoolers. It is a just in case the intercoolers were to go bad. I don’t want to take water into the engines. There is no record of the intercoolers being serviced so I am leery of their condition. And I don’t need 225 hp per engine anyway.

Yes, OHV 120 hp 260 cubic inch (I think) Zenith updrafts. The boat is a Stephens built in 1937, she is still cranking along, the reliable motors are her best feature!http://https://youtu.be/P_GLn8SKwGA?t=61

We cruised up and down the East Coast of the USA in our Albin 43 with a 120hp Lehman. Cruised at 7 (flat water, no current) knots and fuel economy was outstanding. Naturally aspirated Lehman - very easy to maintain, even for me.