Hi Garret: If your 5000 hours life expectancy is anywhere near accurate for the new higher performance, high speed diesels, then I'm glad I still have my gasoline engines. (I have no idea if that figure is realistic) In all of my re-power from gasoline to diesel calculations, I have assumed 20,000 hours and still the cost to re-power with diesel doesn't come even close to being economic. But at 5,000 hours, even die-hard diesel guys would choke. I hope Paul pops up with some comments on this thread. -----Original Message----- From: E16 [mailto:E16@telus.net] Sent: Wednesday, July 05, 2000 4:32 PM To: trawler-world-list@samurai.com Subject: TWL: Marine Diesels At the very beginning of the manual for the 120 HP Ford Lehman is a box containing a rather amusing warning which, in several different ways, says, maintain properly, but if working well, LEAVE THEM ALONE!!!! <SNIP>

My experience is gasoline engines are good for about 1000 hours in a typical planing hull boat application...Some as little as 500 hours, maybe 1500 if babied. That's at least four or five repowers compared to the 5000 hour diesel. The economics really depend on how may hours you put on a boat a year. The typical recreational boater runs 100-200 hrs/yr, making gas much cheaper. But commercial or cruising applications where 1000+ hr/yr are common would definitely tilt the scale to the diesel. Not to mention the greater safety, reliability and economy of the diesel. Repowering from gas to diesel carries with it a whole group of issues including transmission, propshaft, prop, fuel system, tankage and other concerns, adding to the cost and making such a change seldom justifiable. Frank Timpano die-hard diesel guy, but not choking "diesel powered" Hatteras 38 DCMY "Discovery" Deltaville, VA on the Chesapeake At 04:37 PM 7/5/00 -0700, Joe Engel wrote: >Hi Garret: > >If your 5000 hours life expectancy is anywhere near accurate for the new >higher performance, high speed diesels, then I'm glad I still have my >gasoline engines. (I have no idea if that figure is realistic) > >In all of my re-power from gasoline to diesel calculations, I have assumed >20,000 hours and still the cost to re-power with diesel doesn't come even >close to being economic. But at 5,000 hours, even die-hard diesel guys >would choke. > >I hope Paul pops up with some comments on this thread.