Engine Hours Meter

[Andy73]

So I'm browsing some used boats on the Interweb yesterday...

The listing in question described the boat's engine as recently replaced with 2900hrs on it (maybe they didn't use the recently, but anyway...), however in the pictures they happened to show a shot of the engine hours meter which read well over 6000 hours.

I emailed the broker and he replied it was normal not to replace the engine meter during an engine replacement, so the meter didn't read the correct time.

Does that sound right? I have never done a replacement, and had never really encountered the issue before so I was a bit surprised. To me, if you were replacing the engine, a new meter would probably be part of the job.

[Jim Cate]

Andy, while I would also replace the meter, I can (just barely) believe that the broker is correct. FWIW, I've found that hour meters don't last forever, and they don't cost all that much compared to the ticket for a new engine... so replacing it would be a no-brainer for me.

Who knows what idiocies previous owners have practiced?!!

Cheers,

Jim

[Andy73]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

I've found that hour meters don't last forever, and they don't cost all that much compared to the ticket for a new engine... so replacing it would be a no-brainer for me.

Thanks Jim

[MarkJ]

Engine hour meters are cheap, like $40 and take five minutes to install so i would find it difficult to believe anyone would do a multi, multi thousand dollar job and skimp on the $40.

Beware.

And if you asses it to be a lie then what else have they lied about?

I have changed my hour meter but have the old one for when I sell the boat so the prospective buyer can see it.

[sailorboy1]

the hour meter on my boat is part of the tach and is around $250 (I know because my tach isn't working so looked it up)

But if I were going to lie about the engine hours of a "recent" engine I would have chosen a lot less than 2900, so I would believe it.

But note that the recent engine now has the same number of hours as the old one they killed. Just have it surveyed and the oil tested.

[a64pilot]

Whatever it's worth on aircraft, you never replace the hobbs for an engine overhaul, book of course states hobbs time when engine was overhauled.
Surely they have paperwork that states number of hours on the hobbs when the engine was replaced.
Hobbs time without substantiating logs means relatively nothing as it's so easy to just simply un-plug a hobbs or change to another one.
Tach time as in when the hour meter is in the tach is a little more believable as if the tach is operating, the hour meter is running