Engine, Mercruiser 350.

[FjordNautique]

New to the Forum and new owner of a 1988 Ski Nautique. (No engine), just looking at a couple options.
Based In Norway so a little limited on what’s available. Mercruiser 350 mag. Any good as a replacement?.
other option would be to marinize a Chevy 350. This option would be a lot more expensive unfortunately.

Look forward to any advice.

Ryder .

[Peter6000]

New to the Forum and new owner of a 1988 Ski Nautique. (No engine), just looking at a couple options.
Based In Norway so a little limited on what’s available. Mercruiser 350 mag. Any good as a replacement?.
other option would be to marinize a Chevy 350. This option would be a lot more expensive unfortunately.

Look forward to any advice.

Ryder .

I had a Mercruiser 350 with MPI in my Tige run it for some 5 years with no problems. Had 800h on it when I sold it. Plenty of power and very quiet in comparison to the GT40 in my SN now.
I would go with the Merc over the GM.

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[FjordNautique]

Hi Peter.

okay nice. That’s great, as to marinize an engine would be quite expensive here. Getting manifolds etc.
I am not hugely experienced with engines apart from changing my car oil etc. here the Merc I am looking at. Just making sure
I am talking about the same engine ?. I have attached a photo.

regards.

Ryder

[hal2814]

Your boat was probably built with a right handed PCM 351 and 1:1 Velvet Drive transmission. There were several other configuration options but that is the most common for an 88 Ski. A good starting question would be what do you have? Is the transmission still there or do you need that, too? Can you get some pics of what you have (including the transmission tag of you have it). I suspect you’re going to have to convert a right-handed 351 setup to a left-handed 350 to make that engine work but it’s probably best to know what you’re working with before going down that rabbit hole.

[FjordNautique]

Hi Hal.

here is what I have. .

[SilentSeven]

Do you have the transmission? If you do, helpful to post a picture. Or, does the Merc engine come with a transmission?

[gary s]

That Mercury is an I/O engine. A PCM 40 or 80 1:23:1trans would take care of the rotation difference but you'll need whatever misc parts to convert it into to an inboard ie bellhousing,correct starter etc. Not impossible but more difficult because of your location. PCM Ford to Chevy mounts would help as well

[hal2814]

Looks like you need an engine and transmission. That makes me wonder why they were taken out. Are you sure the stringers are in good shape? I’d hate to see you do a lot of work only to have to turn around and redo the stringers. You may want to pop over to correctcraftfan and ask about this there. They love older Correct Crafts.

Missing so much does give you some options. You need an engine, a transmission, and a bell housing to mate them. You’ll probably need to move and/or replace the motor and transmission mounts. That looks like a PCM wiring harness so if you go with a Merc you’ll have to figure out the wiring. You also need to make sure that your transmission can accept a left-handed engine. i don’t think Merc. If it’s a 1:1 velvet drive it’s pretty easy to switch it back and forth. You’ll also need a left-handed propeller if you don’t already have one. Looks like you still have your coupler and shaft. You may need a slightly shorter or longer shaft depending on how you set everything up. And then when you finally get it all together and running you need to make sure the doghouse still fits.

So in short it’s a lot of lot of work but you’ll learn a lot on the way and hopefully have a deep appreciation of how simple a true inboard is at the end of everything. As much a pain as this will be, it’s nothing compared to repowering a stern drive.

[FjordNautique]

Hi All.

No Transmission either I am affraid. I havent bought the mercruiser yet. Still keeping it as an option, but After what I have heard from everyone. It sounds possible just alot of work. Going to search online if there are any engines in Europe/uk I could import. I havent paid alot for the Boat. So I am expecting to spent a few thousend on the Engine and transmission.

appreciate all the quick replies with advice.

Ryder.

[GMLIII]

FjordNautique You may check the CorrectCraft Fan forum. More topics on vintage Correct Craft boats and restorations then on Planet Nautique forum.

CorrectCraftFan.com Forums

[Peter6000]

FjordNautique You may check the CorrectCraft Fan forum. More topics on vintage Correct Craft boats and restorations then on Planet Nautique forum.

CorrectCraftFan.com Forums

I use to live in Germany and pricing for marine engines is quit high.
It may even makes sense to ship one from the US it's at least worth looking at.

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[bturner]

Unfortunately with the engine and trans completely missing my guess is that you're going to be looking at more like $5 - 6K before you have something running. A quick search on Michigan Motorz (a popular site for new and rebuilt engines/trans) has you at about $4500 for an engine and trans without shipping and all the crazy import taxes/fees I'd expect to see trying to import these components. The engine would be a long block so you'd still need the intake, carb, raw water pump, alternator, exhaust risers/manifolds, hoses and brackets. Based on the very limited view of the boat I would expect you would might need throttle, shift and steering cables as well.

https://www.michiganmotorz.com/products/marine-engines

Unless you can source a bunch of used gear locally it is going to be a challenge making the numbers work on this old girl......

[FjordNautique]

Yeah very true haha. I have been doing some reasearch last night at create engines and as you say its up there at 8/10 thousand euro.
but there are not many if any of these things in Norway. All in I have estimated 12 Thousand euro. Belive it or not to get a 40-50knot boat with inboards.
fully built is not too bad. But yes it’s 25% import tax. But it will keep my beer consumption down I hope.

I was hoping to get it ready for the summer season. But with sourcing parts it’s probably not until next summer. We will see

[SilentSeven]

BTW...someone above mentioned checking the stringers before you spend any money on engine bits. This is super wise advise.

[Peter6000]

Yeah very true haha. I have been doing some reasearch last night at create engines and as you say its up there at 8/10 thousand euro.
but there are not many if any of these things in Norway. All in I have estimated 12 Thousand euro. Belive it or not to get a 40-50knot boat with inboards.
fully built is not too bad. But yes it’s 25% import tax. But it will keep my beer consumption down I hope.

I was hoping to get it ready for the summer season. But with sourcing parts it’s probably not until next summer. We will see

If you want to do 50 knots you may want to look for somthing bigger like 460 7.5l.
My 99 SN with the stock gt40 did about 42 mph. After converting from stock MPI to a real fuel injection it does 48 mph but still fare away from 57 mph (50 knots).
Somebody mentioned carburater I personally would stay away from that.

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