Members' Online Book: Engines For Cruising Boats, Chapter 8 of 12

Selection Criteria For The New Engine For “Morgan’s Cloud”

John Published Apr 27, 2010 12 comments Updated April 1, 2018

Our old engine was a Cummins six cylinder naturally aspirated (no turbo-charger) 5.9 litre diesel that theoretically put out 120 horse power (HP) at 2800 RPM. (I say “theoretically”, because we suspect that it never did develop its specified horse power or torque due to the blow-by problem.) It swung a 21 inch MaxProp through a Velvet Drive 72 transmission with 1.88:1 reduction gear.

I’m sharing all this mind-numbing detail because it represents an essential starting point for what turned out to be a complex multi-factor decision that many other boat owners will eventually be faced with.

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Meet the Author

John

John was born and brought up in Bermuda and started sailing as a child, racing locally and offshore before turning to cruising. He has sailed over 100,000 miles, most of it on his McCurdy & Rhodes 56, Morgan's Cloud, including eight ocean races to Bermuda, culminating in winning his class twice in the Newport Bermuda Race. He has skippered a series of voyages in the North Atlantic, the majority of which have been to the high latitudes. John has been helping others go voyaging by sharing his experience for twenty years, first in yachting magazines and, for the last 12 years, as co-editor/publisher of AAC.

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