Engine Rebuild

[ZIRB3L]

Hello all, I plan on buying a boat during this coming winter/off season and had a question. My goal is an 03/05 210 or at least one of the original 210 hulls. I have spent lots of time looking at listings over the last couple months and found several that seamed in great shape and a good price but 1000+ hrs.

At what point do these engines need a rebuild. Obviously a lot rides on the maintenance of the previous owners but what is a good rule of thumb to go by? What should I look for in a boat with that many hours? Also generally how much is an engine rebuild and what does it all replace, is it something I can do myself or should I just pay someone else to do it right and avoid headaches?

Thanks

[Ryan1776]

Good morning!
Well for starters I'm in the same "boat" as you. (pun intended) I'm looking for the same vintage as you are so I'll be watching this thread for little things to look for as far as the hull and accessories are concerned. As far as the engine, I can help you there.
How much mechanical aptitude do you have? Have you just changed your own oil, or have you taken an engine apart before?
It's not that you can't rebuild your own first motor, in fact, I highly recommend it, WITH the guidance of someone who's done it many times. Hearing your first build start is a very rewarding experience. Hearing it blow up because the rod clearances weren't right, is horrifying! Not from experience, but just from other peoples stories. I know a pretty decent car guy who didn't clean his crank oil galleys and his 20k 1000hp engine blew up.....found out the machine shop broke a drill bit in the cross oil galley and didn't remove it......therefore starving the rod journal of oil. DOH!
The great benefit of pulling your own engine and rebuilding it is, if something happens later, you've got a great working knowledge of how to work on it!

Start here, hopefully when you go to look at a used boat the seller will allow you some poking around.
Best thing to get is a compression tester. You remove the spark plug and thread this gauge into the plug hole.
You disable the ignition system, remove coil wire. Crank the engine, approx 3-4 seconds. The gauge will read the cylinder pressure, which is simply how much "compression" that cylinder makes. 150-180psi is generally pretty good.
When I rebuild my engine the worst cylinder had 85psi!!! The best was 120psi. Terrible.

That won't tell you the condition of the oil pump, how clean the motor is etc, but you can learn A LOT about how the engine was treated simply by that number. I like to check all 8 but usually gabbing 4, 2 per side can give you a good feel.

As far as what needs to be replaced in a rebuild...
Short block-
It'll depend on how the cylinder walls look at tear down, but a good list is this....
Gaskets (head, intake, oil pan, timing, water pump, valve cover....), oil pump, bearings, pistons, piston rings. If the cylinder walls are bad, it will need to be bored and honed, sometimes just a hone can be done to clean up the walls, but pistons are so cheap anymore, if your that far into the project, just do it all. That will pretty much take care of the short block, which consists of the rotating assembly. Crankshaft, rods, pistons, the block itself.

Heads-for a boat this can be an interesting thing. Cars see varied rpms all the time. Boats see a lot of constant high rpms.
So the valve train can have some high wear. If the oil was changed regularly, the valve guides could be decent, but again when you're that far into a project installing new liners is worth it.
Valve springs should be checked for correct pressures, the seats should be looked at along with the valve face.

I know you asked for cost, but that's so determinant on what all needs to be done and what the machine shop will charge.
You could get carried away real easy and buy a stroker kit! crank, rods, pistons, rings, for a grand or so, depending on cubic inch and company. It'll come balanced and ready to bolt together in your freshly machined block.


This just scratched the surface, feel free to ask any more specific questions!

Ryan

[First226]

A properly maintained boat should last well past 2500 hours.

[charlesml3]

A properly maintained boat should last well past 2500 hours.

Oh for sure. I've seen some boats come in from ski schools with 7000 hours and still run just fine. It's all about regular, preventive maintenance.

-Charles

[jhersey29]

My strategy was to find one I could maintain and afford to fix up. Plan was to buy a boat from a dry area so it wasn't a rotten mess. Run it for a year or 2 for 200 hours each year and then new motor or rebuild. 3k to 10k spending on new or rebuild. Gt40 parts are running out so not sure what to do at that point. New interior 2k. So I'm in for about 18k to 23k and still 55k richer than if I had a new boat. But have a new interior and new motor. Slalom skier so new boats offer very little to me. The rebuild or crates have me nervous as I have contacted several rebuilders and machine shops with not even a single email reply.
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[ziepfenj]

My strategy was to find one I could maintain and afford to fix up. Plan was to buy a boat from a dry area so it wasn't a rotten mess. Run it for a year or 2 for 200 hours each year and then new motor or rebuild. 3k to 10k spending on new or rebuild. Gt40 parts are running out so not sure what to do at that point. New interior 2k. So I'm in for about 18k to 23k and still 55k richer than if I had a new boat. But have a new interior and new motor. Slalom skier so new boats offer very little to me. The rebuild or crates have me nervous as I have contacted several rebuilders and machine shops with not even a single email reply.
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I'm doing the same. Restoring a SANTE 220. I purchased a jasper marine replacement long block through my Dad's auto repair shop. The gaskets/cost of going through the heads made sense to get a long block instead of a short block. Plus a 2 year warranty from a company known to stand behind their product. Won't get into price here but it was about half of what I expected (and I expected to pay at the low end of your engine budget.)

[ZIRB3L]

Ty for all the replies.

I guess I may have been a little a head of myself when I said that I might try to rebuild it my self, I do have a couple engine savy friends that may be able to give me a hand. Although it sounds like a motor with 1-2k hours on it (as long as it was maintained) shouldn't be too scary. And yea, like jhersey said, even with spending 5-10k on all new interior and motor I would still be saving money compared to buying a newer boat.