Remove and Repair - advice

[jimbunyard]

Thought I'd let you know there's a Mitsubishi K4D on Ebay for 1900.00. It's listed as "Mitsubishi KD4 Diesel Engine". It looks like the same base engine, you could trade your manifolds, etc. to convert to marine. So if you do the work, maybe 4-4500.00 all up.

I agree this throwaway culture is out of control, not to mention asinine and expensive.

[cwyckham]

Argghh. You guys are killing me with the don't throw it away comments. Mostly because I totally agree with you. I can provide a list of reasons why tracking down the parts and doing it myself won't really work for me in my situation, but it will just make me sound like a whiny wimp. Which is sort of what I'm feeling like right now.

The ebay engine is interesting. It might be a good way to get a block. It has unknown hours, unknown condition, no warrantee, no electrics or sensors, no marinization (not sure how hard it is to install a water pump">raw water pump on it, the rest looks like it's bolt-on more or less).

So now that we've established that this is a Mitsubishi K4D, (which is really cool and I wasn't able to do myself-thank you), we've also established that I could do all the work myself and probably find all the parts for less than westerbeke except some of the marine specific stuff. I'll assume I'd still need to overhaul a $2k block, so we're looking at something like maybe $5k for new block, machining of the bores and head and all the parts?

That's a lot less than $14k. It would also be an amazing learning experience.

Now factor in that I'm unskilled as a mechanic and have no local mentor, don't have any sort of workshop space since I live in a tiny townhouse, and have our first kid arriving in four months. So I have no time, no space, and no skills. So the awesome learning experience is probably off the table if I'm being realistic.

That sort of pushes towards a mechanic/machine shop do the work for me. What would the labour be? 100 hours? That's $10k. Let's say it's half of that and now we're at $5k for the parts and block and $5k for the labour. I'm at $4k less than the newer, lighter, more powerful engine with cheaper parts for ongoing maintenance and a 5 year warrantee.

So I think it maybe comes down to money or time. Funny how a lot of things come out that way.

I'm not arguing here, just thinking out loud. I don't really know what the right answer is, but I need to decide pretty soon.

[sharpey]

You can get a new heatexchanger from Bowman MK170 if I recall correctly.

I know, as I too have a K4D based engine, from Thronycroft... the 80D is the model name they gave it.

I bought a similar no guarantee engine block out of Thailand to replace the seized one the boat came with...

The good news... everything bolts on. The bad news, is that this engine will need a rebuild soon... grumble grumble.

There is a very reasonable source of parts direct from Japan here. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries imports for free to Singapore The only trick is either a) finding a decent mechanic, or b) summoning the courage to do the overhaul myself.

Do you reckon you could overhaul without removing the engine? Mine has decent access, unless the crank had to come out, I reckon I'd be ok.

[jimbunyard]

Well, given your situation, and if the 14,000 isn't too much of a problem, new certainly looks like the best option to me too.

If the 14k is a problem though, and the engine on ebay is as advertised, at 1200 hrs there would be no reason to overhaul that engine for a long time (1200 hrs being very roughly equivalent to 72000 miles on your car).

The problem with warranties is that they are fulfilled by humans (who've already been paid or worse, work for someone who's already been paid), but I guess that's better than nothing at all. Which is a primary reason to DIY for me.

If you go the new route, which I agree is probably your best choice, don't forget that your old engine and gear have value, depending on the actual condition probably at least 1500-2000 for a running takeout engine and gear.

Best regards

[cwyckham]

Originally Posted by sharpey

You can get a new heatexchanger from Bowman MK170 if I recall correctly.

I know, as I too have a K4D based engine, from Thronycroft... the 80D is the model name they gave it.

I bought a similar no guarantee engine block out of Thailand to replace the seized one the boat came with...

The good news... everything bolts on. The bad news, is that this engine will need a rebuild soon... grumble grumble.

There is a very reasonable source of parts direct from Japan here. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries imports for free to Singapore The only trick is either a) finding a decent mechanic, or b) summoning the courage to do the overhaul myself.

Do you reckon you could overhaul without removing the engine? Mine has decent access, unless the crank had to come out, I reckon I'd be ok.

I'm no mechanic (by a long shot), but it depends on whether you're doing just the top end or both top and bottom, I think. It would have to come out for a full overhaul.

Have you done a compression test? I believe that's the gold standard for deciding if it needs an overhaul. If you also drop some oil down into the cylinder and the pressure pops back up to nominal, then you know that it needs a bottom end overhaul. If it stays the same(ish), then you can probably just pull the head and work on the valves/head gasket.

The latter is a lot more straightforward and can probably be done in situ.

[cwyckham]

oh yeah, and the glow plug thread you want for the compression test adapter is 10x1.25 if memory serves. You want one with very little shoulder on it below the threads.

[sharpey]

Thanks for the info. Cheers.