A27 - Engine Room Refit

[smacksman]

Yes, and having cut the pins to length the exposed ends snag on your shirt every time you grovel in the engine room! Like cable ties trimmed ends will open you up like a scapal! And stainless pop rivets with mild steel mandrils.
A bit late for you but the best way I found was to have timber battens bonded on to the fibreglass surfaces; then glue on the insulation; then ss screw through the peg board into the timber battens using ss penny washers to spread the load over the peg board.

[RobS]

On one engine room re-build I did on a center cockpit yacht I faced the sound proofing material with peg board ( hardboard with rows of 1/8" holes to take hooks to display goods in shops ). Once painted it allowed cables and hoses to to be screwed to it.

That's all of my engine room cover-boards

[Sprig1]

Hi JT how did your hatch covers fit? I'm getting ready to do that. I was wondering if the hatches closed. The old sound proofing compressed in the rain gutter. It looked like yours came all the way to the edge of the hatch and would have trouble compressing being two inches thick. I'm doing the bulkheads now.

[JT48348]

Great question!

First let me say I contacted Soundown and they assured me the fittings are stainless. The stainless is magnetic which would indicated its 403 or some such grade. I even put the fittings in water for a while and no rust so that's good to go. Next, turns out the button caps come in 2 sizes, 10g and 12g, and sometimes they get mixed up. Soundown apologized and sent me the correct ones and extra hardware (because I ran out) all free of charge. Great service!

Regarding the hatches fitting. I haven't put them in completed form on the boat yet. But I was worried about the same thing, wondering if the barrier material would get squashed, or not fit, or tear from the way the hatches closed. So I dry fitted everything beforehand and took pictures. The way the hatches fit on the deck I see no problem running the the barrier material to the inside of the hatch lip. It's the hatch lip that sits on the deck and there's plenty of room for barrier material. Just to be sure I double taped my edges for antichaffe. I even marked with a black pen how far inwards you'd have to go to even avoid the deck. It's not feasible in my opinion. So I ran the material right to the edges. You will want that to plug the gap and keep the sound in. The material compresses quite a bit so there will be plenty of room. See the photos below. Hope this helps.

[JT48348]

Incidentally on my original material it compressed at the rain gutter and worked fine. But it tore over time primarily because the barrier material was taped to the hatch over the hatch edges. It couldn't stretch over time and this caused a problem eventually. By making a barrier panel self-sealed inside the hatch edge this problem is solved I think. I wouldn't take the material over the hatch edge. Let the barrier edges be sealed within the hatch edges.

[Sprig1]

Thanks JT I just got my hatch covers off tonight and all cleaned up. I'll reinstall them like you did and mark. The old insulation came off in one piece. Thanks for the help

[smacksman]

On my old 27FC I noticed quite a lot of noise came up through the cable access hole below the steering wheel. Maybe some insulation stuffed in the hole would cure that?

[JT48348]

I had one of these in the hole you're referring to. It kept a nice seal. The down side is it's a rubber boot the goes over a non-ferrous metal ring that screws to the deck or bulkhead. Of course it rusts and desintergrates and was a freaking nightmare to try to remove, sharp jagged edges and all.

I'm looking for an all plastic replacement like this. https://www.amazon.com/Marine-Engine-Ru ... B00JBJXL7U

[Sprig1]

I just ordered some great stuff stone and pond polyurethane spray foam. I'm going to foam all the edges and holes in the engine room. Then install the soundown. It doesn't absorb water. Figured it can't hurt. I have gone this far why stop now. As I said before the more I read the more confused I get

[smacksman]

I hope you have used spray poleurethane foam before. I not I strongly recommend you try a bit off boat first. It is amazing stuff!

[TorreyWP]

JT, looking great in the engine room!

Have you gotten any further selecting the repower set up you plan to put in there? Ive been thinking more and more seriously about a full engine room refit, this thread is inspiring and the heart of the beast isn't getting any younger. I saw a post of yours on another site, i think we are looking in the same places for info. Have you looked at/joined BoatDiesel.com? I have not pulled the trigger yet, but it looks to be a valuable resource.

Mark D's set up with the Cummins 4B is tempting, I drool looking at the TAD website.

[JT48348]

So I signed up for BoatDiesel, paid the fee and was utterly disappointed. I signed up hoping to find a valuable source of info on rebuilding the Nissan Ld28. And there was purported to be a detailed Albin 27 repowering article that I thought would be worth the sign up fee.

Boy was I wrong. There was virtually no info on the Nissan Ld28. The repowering article was terrible. It was little more than "I needed a repowering and paid someone 15k+ to drop in a Yanmar for me." I will give you a copy. Bah! I asked for my money back.

My research on the Nissan Ld28 caused me to give up on rebuilding it. Mark suffered the same fate and chose the Cummins. I'm waffling between the Cummins 4b3.3m and Beta 38.

The more I think about it and my refit, recently the more I lean towards the Beta 38. My research on the A27 and the HP needed to get the boat to perform various ways is at odds with the general opinions here. And every time I bring it up apples get mixed with oranges. People try to argue resale value, designers intent, imaginary usage data, outrunning thunderstorms, just to justify large heavy engines in a boat designed to go hull speed efficiently. I think these arguments are vox populi.

I question the benefit if the Cummins. Does the extra hp do any good. Mark reports his boat rides bow high at WOT and he gets 9knt max. I can supposedly get 8knts with the Beta in same situation. And if I can't, so what. I can't get 10 knots, very few people ever get 10knt+. Let's be honest. You don't burn >1 gallon of fuel like that. This boat is not built to run 10-14knots regularly. I've actually taken my boat entirely apart and crawled into every corner. Albin was doing some very creative marketing.

Both these engines burn same fuel at our hull speed, Beta probably less. The Beta weighs less, its quieter, its smaller, it's more narrow, not as high, and has some great Beta features. As I redo my engine room, I think small would be better. The Beta is 10" shorter and 6" narrower. Imagine that space. Theres Beta 38s in boats configured like ours in Europe for canal and coastal cruising. With the Beta you've repowering tech help, warranty, and service a phone call away. They do your engine mount mockup for you. There's not much diff in price between the two. With the Cummins you are very much on you're own.

There's just not a lot of other options, and the price is what it is I guess.

[tego]

Joe, I concur on the Beta. I've done a lot of research on this and if I do have to repower in the future, I can't think of a better engine. I don't need to outrun any hurricanes and I'd love the extra room in my ER. I'm going to have to replace the timing belt in the near future and there's NO access to work on the front of the Nissan. As long as my current engine is good (and it runs like a swiss watch), I'll keep it, but if it starts to go, I'm going with the Beta. Ben

[JT48348]

Ben, that's exactly what I'm thinking. The room to maneuver and do maintenance in the ER would be more valuable than 1 knot. The Beta is also 200lbs lighter.

Now you tell me, is worth $400 for a white paint job?
Ouch

[Beta Don]

I think you'll be happy with the Beta 38 Joe - It sounds like you have very reasonable expectations and 38 Hp will more than meet those. You only *need* 20 to 25 Hp to move the boat at hull speed under most conditions - 6.5 knots is the sweet spot for economy. 20 Hp equates to 1 GPH of fuel burn and we averaged a little more than 1 gallon over 1,000 hours on our trip

Don