Double B

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D - D was a straightforward repower. “To get the engines out, we took the manifolds and turbos off. The 8V92‘s flywheel housing is 32 inches and the salon door is 34 inches with the doorjambs off,” says Charlie Schloemer, president of Palm Beach Power. The narrower Series 60 slid right in.

Simple fiberglass and wood stringers common as engine beds in ’84 were capped with aluminum structures similar to the way engines are mounted in new boats today. Old 2-cycle Detroit Diesel engines typically require larger exhausts than their new 4-stroke counterparts, so the boat needed only new risers between turbo and muffler. Hatteras tended to overbuild a bit, so the original 2 1/2-inch Aquamet shafts were more than adequate.

Schloemer suggests new transmissions, purchased as a package with engines so covered under warranty, rather than trying to rebuild old transmissions.

“When I quote a repower, I include any work that should be done to the support system for the new engines,” Schloemer says. “Fuel lines and filters, batteries and cables, all that needs to be looked at. When everything is out of the way, that’s also the time to look at generators, water heaters, air conditioners, anything that is normally hard to access.”

Double B (above, right) was also a straightforward job. “We always leave a little extra room when we build a boat,” says Paul Spencer, president of Spencer Yachts. “That's why we could put in a little longer and taller motor. It would be a mistake to think a boat like that would never be repowered.”

Exhausts were increased 2 inches in diameter, but shaft size wasn’t increased. “With the added horsepower, we find a tendency to crack the shaft at the keyway in the taper,” Spencer says. “We could have increased to a 3 1/2-inch shaft, but that’s somewhere near double the weight plus added drag,” he said. “Instead we switched to a splined taper. They seem to hold the horsepower well.”

Spencer says such details won’t be overlooked with the right yard. “A lot of people make the mistake of choosing the cheapest bid,” he says. “You want to make sure everything is done so it looks like the boat was built that way, not like it was a redo. There is always a way to do the job right and still make it look nice.”