Here is a video which I took from Chuck S/V Perrovida at perrovida.com who did a Beta Marine 37.5 engine installation.
October 2010 - At Marina Cortez Harbor Island, San Diego, CA
What Chuck said about the install:
"I bought my sailboat, a 1978 Islander Freeport after it had been damaged
during hurricane Ivan. The original Perkins 4-108 had gotten submerged and
needed rebuilt or replaced.
By the time you rebuild a motor ,transmission then replace all the old marine
parts, water pump,alternator,heat exchanger etc you are getting pretty close
to the cost of a new motor. I decided on a all new set up and chose the Beta Marine 37.5 HP engine and transmission with a 100 amp alternator.
Being very cost conscience (cheap) I also decided to do the re power myself.
I had never done this type of work before but with all the information available
on the Internet I decided to give it a go.
I first removed the big old heavy Perkins and cleaned up the engine bay. The
Beta Marine diesel came with the transmission attached and a flexible
coupler ready to slide into the prop shaft. My engine came with a 1 inch
coupler but the Freeport had a 1 1/4 shaft. A quick call to Stanley at Beta
Marine and the correct coupler was on the way. The shiny red motor also had
the 4 motor mounts attached and ready to bolt down to the engine bed.
I hung the new engine over the engine bay and gently lowered it into position
with a temporary engine host I built out of wood. I made notes of where I
would have to add on to the factory engine bed. I then raised the engine
back up and out of the way while I modified the engine bed. A quick note on
this. If I would have purchased a new, longer propeller shaft , I would not have
had to modify the engine bed. By using the old shaft I saved money and have
a lot more working room at the front of the engine.
Working with fiberglass is quite easy and lack of experience working with this
material should not stop you from doing this yourself. It took less than a day
to modify the existing bed so that the Beta would have some beefy real estate
to bolt the motor mount to.
The next day I lowered the engine down onto the modified bed. The new
flexible coupler has a flat face that mates up against another flat round plate
on the end of the prop shaft. I roughly aligned these two flat plates using the
adjustable engine feet. When the alignment was close enough that I could
bolt the two plates together, I did so.
A word about engine / shaft alignment. The coupler that Beta Marine supplies
with the engine makes shaft alignment something that anybody can do using
a feller gauge and some patience. No voodoo, just follow the easy to follow
instructions that come with the coupler. When you are finished aligning you
will have full confidence that the shaft is aligned. It took me 2 hours to along
the engine to the shaft.
The most time consuming part of this re power was enlarging the stock
exhaust system. Read the information regarding this that Beta Marine
provides, call Stanley at Beta Marine with any questions. Take your time and
do this part right, your brand new engines life depends on it . Do not assume
that the factory exhaust was designed and installed correctly, mine was not.
After the exhaust the rest of the install is pretty close to plug and play.
Locate the new control panel and plug the supplied harness into the engine,
one connector, that's it.. Feed your new baby with a Racor filtered supply of
diesel fuel. Connect the battery and ground. Connect the raw water supply.
Finally connect the throttle and shift cables
After the rest of the storm damage was repaired we launched Perrovida .
After checking that she was water tight we opened the threw hull for the raw
water supply. I then turned the key and she fired up after a couple of turns. I
let the engine run for a while checking for leaks and just enjoying listing to the
sound of the diesel rumbling beneath my feet. She was running very smooth
and quiet.
The next step was to get away from the dock and see if the same prop that
was installed for the Perkins 4-108 would work for the Beta. After getting
into a open area of water I slowly opened the throttle all the way. The prop
held the engine just a few hundred RPM,s below the engines red line so I
pronounced the prop a match.
My wife had spent the last week loading the boat with supplies so after just 15
minutes of testing the engine we headed (hit) back to the dock, we locked the
car and left on a two month cruise , headed east from Pensacola down the
ICW.
We had a great time getting to see the Panhandle of Florida from the water
and had zero engine problems. I kept checking the engine Alignment
, first every few days expecting something settle but the alignment stayed
spot on.
The way in which I use the boat seems to be hard on the water pump
Impeller. I use the boat for a few months then put it in storage for months at a
times. One blade of the impeller is left in a very bent position and will break
off very quickly after sitting for several months. Now when I get the boat ready
for storage I remove the impeller and store it in a zip lock baggie. It only
takes a couple of minutes to remove or re install. I also disconnect the fuel
supply line and feed the fuel supply with calibration fluid for a couple of
minutes. Calibration fluid is used when mechanics test a re manufactured fuel
pump. The fluid preserves the part while;e it waits on the shelf to be installed.
Since diesel always has a bit of water in it, the injector pump might start to
corrode if left unused for long periods of time, this procedure solves that
problem from ever happening.
After 4 years my Beta Marine diesel has operated flawlessly. I have sailed to
the Bahamas, Mexico and down to Belize. I am using less than 1/2 gallon of
diesel an hour while motoring at 5 knots. I change the oil at the
recommended intervals , which is very easy with the mounted oil pump. I
change the fuel filters more than I need to. After almost 800 hours on the
Tachometer Stanly tells me it is time to adjust the valves."
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