The $9k Boat That's Teaching Me a $14k Lesson - '81 Ericson 30+

Good day all,

I'll try to keep this concise but it's been a week.

I purchased Quatre Étoiles, a 1981 Bruce-King designed Ericson 30+, last month in the SF Bay Area for $9K directly from her former owner. She's previously Miss Laney, and finished 4th in the 2004 single-handed Transpac ( a few owners ago). I fell in love with her history, the hull felt solid, the rigging looked great, the engine did a cold start immediately, and the previous owner put in a lot of upgrades and work. She was re-powered with a Universal M3-20B about 20 years ago that has ~400 hours on it today. There was a list of mostly cosmetic items to take care of, but nothing a little elbow grease couldn't fix. I pulled the trigger.

I elected not to do a pre-purchase survey. I was a first-time sailboat buyer, and the boat looked solid enough to me that I didn't think a survey was necessary. (I know, I know).

Phase 1: "Just a bottom job and a thru hull"

Hauled her out for the first time at the boatyard last week ago. The plan was to do a full bottom job and replace the waste thru-hull - straightforward stuff. I was expecting to pay maybe around $2,500 for the work, if I was lucky.

Bottom job went fine. Thru-hull was swapped out for a new Groco bronze. Upon inspection, the keel seam also needed to be resealed - which turned into 8+ hours of grinding, glassing, and epoxy primer that I wasn't expecting. No big deal, at least it's done. Great! Ready to splash her back in the water and go home to the slip, right? Well, not so fast!

Phase 2: The snowball effect

The yard also noticed the cutlass bearing was completely shot and disintegrating. To replace it, they needed to pull the prop shaft, which meant dropping the rudder to get everything out. They also noticed the old PSS shaft seal was toast, so I went with a new PSS dripless seal while the shaft was out. Each thing led to the next.. all reasonable catches by the yard, but all unplanned costs.

At this point the preliminary invoice hits my inbox: $6,922 for labor and materials. Already well past my "budget"

Phase 3: "That's not going to align"

With the new cutlass bearing and PSS seal in, the yard tries to align the engine to the prop shaft. They can't get it right. They dig deeper and find the reason: the engine mount bracket on the flywheel housing is completely sheared off! Not cracked. Not loose. Sheared clean through.



The engine has likely been sitting on only 3 mount points for years. The excessive vibration is starting to make a lot more sense now..

The previous owner had to have known. A sheared mount doesn't happen overnight, and a boat that vibrates like that is obvious to anyone who runs the engine regularly. The $9k price tag is making a lot more sense now.

The damage:

The yard estimates the remaining work at roughly $5,000 in labor at $160/hr plus parts. The engine needs to be pulled, the flywheel housing and two severely rusted motor mounts replaced, then engine reinstall, shaft alignment, and rudder reinstall.

So the new math is:

• Preliminary invoice: $7,000
• Engine work estimate: $7,000
• Projected total: $14,000

On a $9,000 boat.

Some questions for the community:

1. Has anyone dealt with a sheared flywheel mount bracket on the M3-20B (or similar engine)? Is it absolutely necessary to remove the engine to do this work? Is there some sort of creative welding solution out there that could exist?

2. Is ~31 hours of labor reasonable for this scope on a 30+? Engine pull, flywheel housing and mount replacement, engine reinstall, alignment, rudder reinstall. The engine compartment on these boats is tight, but I want to sanity-check the number.

3. What else should I inspect while the engine is out? I'm already planning to have them check the exhaust hoses, fuel lines, and engine beds (which look rough in the photos). Anything specific to the 30+ or M3-20B that people have found hiding once the engine was pulled?

4. Anyone know of a good independent diesel mechanic in the SF Bay Area? Would love a second set of eyes on the labor estimate before I commit.

I'm not going to lie, this has been extremely rough. There have been moments this week where I've wanted to walk away from this whole thing. I made the classic first-time buyer mistake - I walked the boat, liked what I saw on the surface, and didn't pay for a survey that would have caught what I could't see with my own eyes. I'm learning that the stuff that matters most on an old boat is all below the waterline and behind the engine, and I didn't look hard enough. Lesson learned the expensive way.

I just need to get through this haul-out so I can get out on the water. I'm learning what many have learned before me: "there's nothing more expensive than a cheap boat."

Even though this first chapter with my new boat has been harder and more expensive than anything I imagined, I'm keeping a positive attitude and am still ready to get out on the Bay and enjoy my first sailboat.

Appreciate any advice, commiseration, or "it happened to me too" stories.

Chris
Quatre Étoiles
1981 Ericson 30+
San Francisco, California

As far as diesel work is concerned, Chuck's Marine is a great choice. He will come to your boat in the SF area. If you can get the boat to Sausalito, List Marine is also great.

Sorry to hear this, but as an owner of a1984 E30+, these are great boats, easy to sail, fast, well built, etc.
You might want to replace the fuel tank if that hasn't been done, as they usually begin to leak around 35 years.
Good luck with the repairs, these boats are worth it!
Frank

Frank Langer said:

Sorry to hear this, but as an owner of a1984 E30+, these are great boats, easy to sail, fast, well built, etc.
You might want to replace the fuel tank if that hasn't been done, as they usually begin to leak around 35 years.
Good luck with the repairs, these boats are worth it!
Frank

Click to expand...

Appreciate the encouragement, Frank! Fuel tank should be ok for the time being, I think it was replaced 15 or so years ago.

Welcome to the club! Been there and done that several times over. Don’t feel bad about it, even with a survey that came back “good” I had to completely tear apart the aft end of my 30+ and redo the entire thing with most of the things you mentioned and many more needing replacement. The $$ will never pencil out. Learn and do as much as you can yourself and spend many hours perusing this site. It’s all been done before and documented here.

Here are some of my blogs to get you started. https://ericsonyachts.org/ie/ubs/blog/bigd14s-blog.3493/

Also learn as much as you can about how diesels work and the cooling and fuel systems. Much of the work can be done pretty easily once you get familiar with it and you will want to know your systems in case (when) you need to do an emergency fix and no diesel mechanic is nearby. The search function on this site and YouTube are your friends!

Motor mount thread

At about post #65 I begin to discuss our engine remount adventure, after a snowball effect similar to yours. We had a very good survey done and these were mostly natural extensions of issues he had identified. I like the way Doug says it, boat dollars "will never pencil out". Our initial boat price was a little over double yours. IIRC, the remount cost was more than you're being charged, detailed later in that thread, I think. If it's any consolation, the costs of our first 18 months of expenditures were over double yours (not including my extensive labor) and more multiples since. There have been times I absolutely wanted to bail on the whole affair. When I have unexpected costs like that, I try to console myself with what I've learned. I call it Tuition. - In the words of Red Green, "I'm pullin' for ya. We're all in this together".

We all, us sailors, share your pain. I even made a video about it.

A surveyor might have, should have, caught the shaft seal and the cutless bearing--and maybe the engine mount. But that's not guaranteed.

Every hard hit is a blow, but the fact is that these old boats are all being resurrected. And once returned to the living, we appreciate them more.

I have learned more from my checkbook than any teacher. Experts in sailboat ownership we are, and that's the tuition.

We have put a lot of time (years) & notable money into our boat in the last 30+ years. Once in a while we attend, just for curiosity, an RV show. The cost for that "lifestyle" would be the same or significantly more, in our opinions.
And we'd be stuck herding some multi-wheeled monster down a scary two lane road way too often.

Since most of the mainstream RV's seem to be constructed to a lower standard than even the average production boat, maintenance would be con$tant. (We have several good friends that have done the RV "thing" and will discuss/lecture bystanders on the cost of that hobby. Oh My.)

Echoing Jeff, and being a "Red Green" fan, I would also advise you to "keep your stick on the ice; we're all pullin' for ya!"
It's been a great lifestyle, and much cheaper than golf and much much cheaper than owning/maintaining an old Cessna....

Regards, Loren

5 years in working on this old girl..hope to sail her one day… pocket book on fire but not giving up…best of luck ! With her.

Sorry for your "snowball" turning into a snowman. That engine mount pic looks plenty bad and yes looks way shifted out of alignment. Do you have the broken piece or ? Not sure of your mechanical/DIY capabilities but unless you can do a lot of the work yourself it's going to be very costly using boat yards. Don't think you can replace all the mounts without at least lifting the engine a few inches. Maybe you could tilt it front to back, back to front and get the mounts swapped. But lifting the engine isn't that difficult, A couple 2x4's across the companionway with a block and tackle or using the boom(with halyard for support). Of course it still means getting it fully disconnected and another "snowball". Cost of parts to replace mounts, coupler, shaft, dripless, cutlass, would be around a $1000-1500. If you have the ear it probably could be welded but getting it done in the boat ? Probably not. If you have 4 total mounts I would lean to using large washers top and bottom on that broken ear and the nuts would hold it in conjunction with 3 other new mounts. Just my 2 cents and probably all it's worth.......Great sailing boat by the way and good luck with whatever you decide.

Chris S said:

3. What else should I inspect while the engine is out? I'm already planning to have them check the exhaust hoses, fuel lines, and engine beds (which look rough in the photos). Anything specific to the 30+ or M3-20B that people have found hiding once the engine was pulled?

Click to expand...

While you got the engine out? Here's what I'd do in no particular order:

Repaint the entire engine compartment bright white epoxy paint.
Want to add a nice bright overhead light? Now's the time to to install one before the motor goes back in and you can't reach anything.
Change the glow plugs on the motor (they're ALWAYS a pain to get to)
Change the impeller in your motor's water pump.
Change the zinc in your motor's water pump.
Change all the hoses out for new. Don't reuse hoses, or the clamps. At age 20, they're done. Remember, that raw water hose and clamps are all that's keeping your boat afloat! Don't skimp!
New fuel filters
New water strainer if she don't got one. (She might not!)
New belt
Now's the best chance you'll ever get to hose that motor down and make her purty.
Check the heat exchanger... it's probably clogged up.

Those are off the top of my head... chatgpt can probably think of a few more.

HerbertFriedman said:

As far as diesel work is concerned, Chuck's Marine is a great choice. He will come to your boat in the SF area. If you can get the boat to Sausalito, List Marine is also great.

Click to expand...

Chuck is great. His rate is $180/hour, I think, however you are going to need the services of a whole marine yard to get the engine out and the parts made. Chuck is more of a mobile mechanic.

Chris S said:

Good day all,

I'll try to keep this concise but it's been a week.

I purchased Quatre Étoiles, a 1981 Bruce-King designed Ericson 30+, last month in the SF Bay Area for $9K directly from her former owner. She's previously Miss Laney, and finished 4th in the 2004 single-handed Transpac ( a few owners ago). I fell in love with her history, the hull felt solid, the rigging looked great, the engine did a cold start immediately, and the previous owner put in a lot of upgrades and work. She was re-powered with a Universal M3-20B about 20 years ago that has ~400 hours on it today. There was a list of mostly cosmetic items to take care of, but nothing a little elbow grease couldn't fix. I pulled the trigger.

I elected not to do a pre-purchase survey. I was a first-time sailboat buyer, and the boat looked solid enough to me that I didn't think a survey was necessary. (I know, I know).

Phase 1: "Just a bottom job and a thru hull"

Hauled her out for the first time at the boatyard last week ago. The plan was to do a full bottom job and replace the waste thru-hull - straightforward stuff. I was expecting to pay maybe around $2,500 for the work, if I was lucky.

Bottom job went fine. Thru-hull was swapped out for a new Groco bronze. Upon inspection, the keel seam also needed to be resealed - which turned into 8+ hours of grinding, glassing, and epoxy primer that I wasn't expecting. No big deal, at least it's done. Great! Ready to splash her back in the water and go home to the slip, right? Well, not so fast!

Phase 2: The snowball effect

The yard also noticed the cutlass bearing was completely shot and disintegrating. To replace it, they needed to pull the prop shaft, which meant dropping the rudder to get everything out. They also noticed the old PSS shaft seal was toast, so I went with a new PSS dripless seal while the shaft was out. Each thing led to the next.. all reasonable catches by the yard, but all unplanned costs.

At this point the preliminary invoice hits my inbox: $6,922 for labor and materials. Already well past my "budget"

Phase 3: "That's not going to align"

With the new cutlass bearing and PSS seal in, the yard tries to align the engine to the prop shaft. They can't get it right. They dig deeper and find the reason: the engine mount bracket on the flywheel housing is completely sheared off! Not cracked. Not loose. Sheared clean through.

View attachment 54984

The engine has likely been sitting on only 3 mount points for years. The excessive vibration is starting to make a lot more sense now..

The previous owner had to have known. A sheared mount doesn't happen overnight, and a boat that vibrates like that is obvious to anyone who runs the engine regularly. The $9k price tag is making a lot more sense now.

The damage:

The yard estimates the remaining work at roughly $5,000 in labor at $160/hr plus parts. The engine needs to be pulled, the flywheel housing and two severely rusted motor mounts replaced, then engine reinstall, shaft alignment, and rudder reinstall.

So the new math is:

• Preliminary invoice: $7,000
• Engine work estimate: $7,000
• Projected total: $14,000

On a $9,000 boat.

Some questions for the community:

1. Has anyone dealt with a sheared flywheel mount bracket on the M3-20B (or similar engine)? Is it absolutely necessary to remove the engine to do this work? Is there some sort of creative welding solution out there that could exist?

2. Is ~31 hours of labor reasonable for this scope on a 30+? Engine pull, flywheel housing and mount replacement, engine reinstall, alignment, rudder reinstall. The engine compartment on these boats is tight, but I want to sanity-check the number.

3. What else should I inspect while the engine is out? I'm already planning to have them check the exhaust hoses, fuel lines, and engine beds (which look rough in the photos). Anything specific to the 30+ or M3-20B that people have found hiding once the engine was pulled?

4. Anyone know of a good independent diesel mechanic in the SF Bay Area? Would love a second set of eyes on the labor estimate before I commit.

I'm not going to lie, this has been extremely rough. There have been moments this week where I've wanted to walk away from this whole thing. I made the classic first-time buyer mistake - I walked the boat, liked what I saw on the surface, and didn't pay for a survey that would have caught what I could't see with my own eyes. I'm learning that the stuff that matters most on an old boat is all below the waterline and behind the engine, and I didn't look hard enough. Lesson learned the expensive way.

I just need to get through this haul-out so I can get out on the water. I'm learning what many have learned before me: "there's nothing more expensive than a cheap boat."

Even though this first chapter with my new boat has been harder and more expensive than anything I imagined, I'm keeping a positive attitude and am still ready to get out on the Bay and enjoy my first sailboat.

Appreciate any advice, commiseration, or "it happened to me too" stories.

Chris
Quatre Étoiles
1981 Ericson 30+
San Francisco, California

Click to expand...

Hours sound like a decent estimate of the time.

Christian Williams said:

A surveyor might have, should have, caught the shaft seal and the cutless bearing--and maybe the engine mount. But that's not guaranteed.

Every hard hit is a blow, but the fact is that these old boats are all being resurrected. And once returned to the living, we appreciate them more.

I have learned more from my checkbook than any teacher. Experts in sailboat ownership we are, and that's the tuition.

Click to expand...

I agree. Given some of the folks who have AMS certification these days, a good survey might have caught some of this, but by no means would that be certain. In buying used boats, it is really important to understand that very few used boats more than a few years old are not going to need extensive refitting--so it often pays to pay extra to buy an exceptionally maintained boat with the basic good bones (you certainly tried) which means engine/drivetrain, rigging, sails and bottom, but also have a list with estimated costs of the upgrades to get the boat in serviceable condition. Good that you are asking here as there is a lot of help available. Not to add to your grief, but the 30+ is reportedly a unusually difficult model of Ericson to do engine work on because of access--I have not worked on one, but that is my recollection. Perhaps a current 30+ owner can be more help.

Chris S said:

The previous owner had to have known. A sheared mount doesn't happen overnight, and a boat that vibrates like that is obvious to anyone who runs the engine regularly. The $9k price tag is making a lot more sense now.

Click to expand...

Or the engine may have already been vibrating before the mount breaking, the vibration itself having caused the failure. Previous owner might of not noticed difference between vibration and more vibration.

I definitely feel your pain; I have been hit with multiple large expenditures over things I would never have thought of (I have now spent more on repairs (well, repairs and upgrades like new nav electronics) than the purchase price.) And that's despite a good survey by a reputable surveyor. I think @vanilladuck is in a similar situation here based on a recent post. The fact is that (as someone says above) any 30-year old boat is a resurrection... or, at the minimum (mine was/is actually in quite good shape) all boats this age are at the point that a lot of original systems need replacement/overhaul. And there are a lot of various systems - standing rigging; running rigging; sails; throughulls; engine; nav/vhf/ais electronics; battery charging systems, etc etc.

What I'm saying is,

--> This will not stop. There will be more hits of a few $k. Frankly, a few $k is not a big hit for a keelboat with an inboard engine.

As far as I can tell, there are two approaches to used boats: 1) buy a pretty new (< 10 yrs) one, or one someone has already completely refit (good luck, but it happens I'm sure) for a lot of money, do your cruising, then sell it to recover a good bit of your investment. Or, 2) buy an old one ($9k is definitely an old one; 5X+ that would still be, though maybe not in this market) and be prepared for a lot of refitting, either by yourself (many hours) or paid yards (more $$). The only way I know to reduce this would be to skip electronics and and inboard engine, and use only an outboard, since the engine and electronics eat up a lot of cash. But it will still never stop at $9k. One can make ones' peace with that, or decide to find a cheaper boat (e.g. an old J24 with an outboard, no throughhulls, and a huge supported base of parts -- but not a cruising boat) or something.

I'm not trying to depress you -- you can make all of a lot of this a LOT cheaper by doing the work yourself, and by not sailing where it would matter too much (no offshore), by ripping out the head for a composting, etc. My costs have absolutely been significantly higher because I do not have time to do it myself and want to take the boat offshore. A dockmate takes his boat up to Napa (who knew you could get there by water?!) where haulout is cheaper and you can do your own work on the boat (I think he repaints his own bottom.) That sort of thing can save you a literal fortune, and the (extremely helpful and friendly) threads on this site can help you figure out what you need to do.

--> My advice is not to blow your last penny now, since something else WILL come up. Triage things that are most important.

Also, yard estimates are often under by more than 10%, and not because they are cheating you -- often opening up one thing to fix it brings another can of worms to light. Budget accordingly (I always assume 20% over, and them am pleasantly surprised every time it isn't. I'd give that a smiley emoji, but it's not quite smiley, just wry.)

In terms of specifics to your question, @C. Shamis 's list is excellent. I did a lot of that stuff (impellor/belts/etc., and also motor mounts) but the cooling system (and exhaust elbow if you have a Yanmar 3GM engine) may well need work. If your engine (and any other -- e.g. connected to a throughhull!) hoses are original on a 40-year old boat, definitely replace them. For my boat, the yard just told me last month that the water circuit from the engine cooling to the hot water heater (for engine heating) was clogged and I needed a new exhaust elbow. $5k ish, and unexpected. Like I said, things will happen on a 30-year old boat; happily it was caught early. New elbow I had to have, but the hot water loop... just disconnected it and plugged it off. I don't use hot water anyway. (C.f. 'triage', above : ) But you want to find engine issues when you are not trying to use the engine to get out of the way of a big ship... so worth doing now. There are a lot of big ships in narrow confines on SF bay.

Re: specifics, the engine-bay sound insulation will also probably be bad; might consider replacing it _if the engine is out_... but honestly, for the motor mounts they shouldn't need to pull the engine all the way out (they didn't for mine.) Be careful of asking for stuff (repainting the engine bay) that might force them to pull it all the way out, which would drive costs way up. Honestly, if they ever have to pull mine fully out, I think I'll want to repalce the whole engine since that will be less than the labor costs. And by the way, my engine sound insulation is... still bad. Triage; I can live with it.

For the work you list, $7k does not sound unreasonable to me in the bay area (where I am too) -- I had a new shaft put on, and cutlass bearing, etc., and if I add it up it up with the (years previous) new motor mounts it was in that range all together. I will say that I will not have work done at the 4-letter yard here ever again. I go to Svendsen's in Pt Richmond; no yard is perfect, but FWIW they have never abused me and often gone above and beyond. For pure engine work there are people who will come to your boat, though -- see the recommendations above. Probably cheaper as they likely have lower overhead in terms of yard space, etc.

Anyway, I hope this is helpful rather than depressing. If the costs depress you, consider doing a lot of your work yourself, up in Napa if it requires haulout.

PS: I am not convinced the previous owner knew the motor mount was bad. You have to know enough to know if the vibration is unusual, and maybe motor enough to really know (many here don't -- often only for 5 minutes getting out of the fairway) and care enough to go digging, and be the sort of person on top of systems, and... etc. I am 100% sure that if I ever sell my boat, the purchaser will say I "must have known" something... even though I am all over this boat maintaining and fixing. I just never knew to check an exhaust elbow, for instance... on a 30-year old boat there will always be something.

PS: I would definitely fix the engine mount, and the cheaper things on @C. Shamis 's list (impellor, belts, fuel filters -- disposables, basically). For me, probably the hoses too. So this doesn't affect the work you describe in this post.

But re: further work, I will quote myself from an earlier thread (to a different new owner - no reason you'd have seen it):

"The best advice I got when I first bought a boat, and which I immediately ignored and then was very, very sorry I had ignored was: 'Sail for a season before you go to a boatyard for anything." That gives you time to a) learn from fellow owners/dockmates which are the non-scammy boatyard(s) in your area and b) figure out what you really want/need done."

Though make sure you/someone is diving to check/replace your zincs regularly -- if those are gone, your engine and other systems become the new zincs...
I found installing a galvanic isolator (relatively cheap, DIY at your slip within reasonable effort though I did not DIY it) saved a lot of money on zincs, BTW.

N.A. said:

I think @vanilladuck is in a similar situation here based on a recent post.

Click to expand...

Aye, if you'd like to see more shenanigans in boat repair:
You'll notice I started that thread in 2023. We might forget, but the boat will always remember

I bought Rumour knowing I had a lot of work to do. I grew up in a sailing family and my dad was always working on our boat, no matter how new or old it was. We like to tinker. So, I had a decent idea what I was in for, esp. since I want to go offshore. My surveyor helped save a couple thousand dollars on the price, for which I thanked him. But, I knew that wouldn't matter in the long run.

I've rebought my boat through refitting about three times. I like quality gear and systems that work well without compromise. So, when something on the boat isn't working to my satisfaction it becomes either 1) a review of my operational sailing habits or 2) a project. Sometimes both. I plan and execute a vast majority of the work myself, because I want to save money and have intimate knowledge of how things are put together -- again, in preparation for sailing solo offshore. This haul out, which involves dropping the keel, will be the fourth time I rebuy my boat. It's a labor of love.

Chris S said:

4. Anyone know of a good independent diesel mechanic in the SF Bay Area?

Click to expand...

@Chris S, I feel your pain. While I haven't used them personally, I've heard really good things about Nina over at Berkeley Marine Center for engine work. I'm currently replacing my motor mounts, new prop, new coupler, shaft alignment as well. My mounts are pretty rusty and my engine needs a coat of paint -- I hope I'm getting to everything in time before I lose a bracket too.

A note on DIY: This forum and the extensions into websites and YouTube channels hold an enormous amount of experience and knowledge. Not to mention the humans here are kind and caring. I wouldn't have been able to do a lot of the work I've done without this community. If anyone needs a group support call, I'm available for chats and would be happy to share anything I've know about boats.

A bit of well-known humour: "There's nothing more expensive than a free boat." At least your boat wasn't free, Chris. Keep going! Prioritize and enjoy the journey. The sailing memories you'll build will be priceless