Yamaha ME421STI service

kubcat · 12 June 2011, 09:18

After 2 months of anticipation, the Ribtec 890SX has finally arrived.

There has been some minor damage from the shipping that needs attending to but in the meantime as it sits in my garage we would like to service the engines and drives.

We have been assured it has been serviced religiously but it was in Papua New Guinea and we doubt anyone really new what they were doing.

Being in Australia, these motors are quite rare and not sure if anyone really knows what they are doing either so we are giving it a shot ourselves.

Besides fluids and filters, is there anything else we should do?

biffer · 12 June 2011, 10:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by kubcat

After 2 months of anticipation, the Ribtec 890SX has finally arrived.

There has been some minor damage from the shipping that needs attending to but in the meantime as it sits in my garage we would like to service the engines and drives.

We have been assured it has been serviced religiously but it was in Papua New Guinea and we doubt anyone really new what they were doing.

Being in Australia, these motors are quite rare and not sure if anyone really knows what they are doing either so we are giving it a shot ourselves.

Besides fluids and filters, is there anything else we should do?

The engine isn't as rare as you think. It's basically a Toyota landcruiser lump. The weak bit is the drive. Make sure you do the oil changes regular

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Nos4r2 · 12 June 2011, 11:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by biffer

The engine isn't as rare as you think. It's basically a Toyota landcruiser lump. The weak bit is the drive. Make sure you do the oil changes regular

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Yep, also as fitted to the Toyota Surf,(it's the KZN130 or KZN185 motor) which is apparently rather popular in Aus.

BogMonster · 12 June 2011, 11:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nos4r2

Yep, also as fitted to the Toyota Surf,(it's the KZN130 or KZN185 motor) which is apparently rather popular in Aus.

Does it also suffer from head/head gasket problems then? Surfs are fairly well known for it, though it's a good grunty engine.

biffer · 12 June 2011, 11:06

Are not the surfs 4 cylinder

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Nos4r2 · 12 June 2011, 11:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by biffer

Are not the surfs 4 cylinder

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Erm, yeah

I'm wrong-there's a 4 cyl 3.0 land cruiser which is the KZN130/185 lump and is also used as a marine engine by Nanni.For some reason I got it in my head it was the same lump.

Nos4r2 · 12 June 2011, 11:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by BogMonster

Does it also suffer from head/head gasket problems then? Surfs are fairly well known for it, though it's a good grunty engine.

Not relelvant to the OP now, but the 2.4 Surfs suffer with cracking heads, not gasket problems. The 3 litre is a good lump.

biffer · 12 June 2011, 11:34

I think the yam 165 hp was the 4 cyl one but the 240 hp was 6 cyl. If you pull the yam sticker off the top of the engine it still has Toyota cast in the top in 40 mm letters

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martini · 12 June 2011, 11:45

Agree with Biffer, the leg is the weak link as with most diesel stern drives, generally 500 hours is the most you'll get out of one before a major overhaul is required. Under-propping the boat helps a lot by reducing load on the bearings and wear on the clutch.

They also can tend to get a bit too hot, many people either drill holes in the plastic top cover to help the flow of seawater through it or fit a drive shower.

Another thing to look out for on the motor is the cast steel mixing elbow. They quickly corrode on the inside which restricts the flow of water through it. A quick way to check is to squeeze the rubber hose feeding the salt water into the mixer at about 3000 rpm, if the hose is hard and under pressure the mixer is probably blocked. Stainless steel replacements are available from a few sources, expensive but then so are the Yammie ones and you'll only have to do it once.

biffer · 12 June 2011, 11:55

Been making stainless exhaust elbows for these engines for nearly 10 years. The later ones from yam are stainless. I change my leg oil every 50 hrs

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Joshv6 · 12 June 2011, 21:16

We have a lost of units in service

The Drives Will Do 1000 hours if you swap them side to side at 500 hours to evan out gear and clutch wear. We Run Castrol SAF-XO Change Every 200 Hours. Drive Shower Are A Must.
But pinion gears do wear and are pron to fail on the SP units.
The TRP is a good drive.

Engines are good, they do crack pistons but not to often.
There of lots of mods that can be done on the engines to aid service life.
We run volvo vds2 oil and now have changed to vds3. units have from 1000 to 3000 hours on them, oil change every 200 hours. when striped after 2500 hours still got honing marks in the bore and not bearing wear.

Cheers Josh

kubcat · 13 June 2011, 10:25

Biffer, we have thousands of 6 cylinder Landcruiser diesels here so the engine side is not what worries me although I think the fuel injection and pistons are different as well as the obvious cooling and exhaust bits. Was thinking of the fuel filters, oil filters, fresh oil and coolant. The air cleaners look clean.

The drives on the other hand as rare as hens teeth here. I have never seen others.

Martini, the skeg is cracked off one of the drives and bent on the other so was thinking of removing the drives and sending them to get welded and straightened. If you spin the prop they feel pretty smooth so I was thinking just an oil change and a repaint would be on the cards. As they have 550 hours, we will as you suggested, swap sides when they go back on. I am debating stripping them down and replacing the bearings as well as inspecting the rest of the drives as this will result in the boat being out of the water for a lot longer than we want. Also will probably add drive showers as on my other boat.

We started the engines today and they started easily and idled smoothly. Will check the hose pressure for the mixing elbows but as it was a salt water boat, I think we will be needing stainless ones sooner or later.

How about water pumps. Are there impellers in the drives or just the engine mounted water pump?

Biffer can you let me know how much for two stainless elbows?

Is there anywhere I can get a workshop manual?

Thanks guys for the help, not sure what I would do without this forum.

biffer · 13 June 2011, 10:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by kubcat

Biffer, we have thousands of 6 cylinder Landcruiser diesels here so the engine side is not what worries me although I think the fuel injection and pistons are different as well as the obvious cooling and exhaust bits. Was thinking of the fuel filters, oil filters, fresh oil and coolant. The air cleaners look clean.

The drives on the other hand as rare as hens teeth here. I have never seen others.

Martini, the skeg is cracked off one of the drives and bent on the other so was thinking of removing the drives and sending them to get welded and straightened. If you spin the prop they feel pretty smooth so I was thinking just an oil change and a repaint would be on the cards. As they have 550 hours, we will as you suggested, swap sides when they go back on. I am debating stripping them down and replacing the bearings as well as inspecting the rest of the drives as this will result in the boat being out of the water for a lot longer than we want. Also will probably add drive showers as on my other boat.

We started the engines today and they started easily and idled smoothly. Will check the hose pressure for the mixing elbows but as it was a salt water boat, I think we will be needing stainless ones sooner or later.

How about water pumps. Are there impellers in the drives or just the engine mounted water pump?

Biffer can you let me know how much for two stainless elbows?

Is there anywhere I can get a workshop manual?

Thanks guys for the help, not sure what I would do without this forum.

don't strip them down till you need to, mig the skeg back on but put wet clothes over the gearbox and down the exhaust, stainless exhaust elbows are £500 each, water pump is below the fuel and water strainer, take the pump off, 2 x 17mm bolts and 2 x hoses, much easier, filters from motor factors, one of my boats had 2.5k hrs on her without any major stuff and i think she's still going strong, if you can get at the turbo oil feed pipe change it for a teflon one or clean it out, if you don't use good oil you get carbon build up in it and it will starve the turbo, pop!, just to rub it in i have 3 spare legs laying around over here

Joshv6 · 13 June 2011, 13:43

Yes engine driven waterpumps.

Cheers Josh

kubcat · 14 June 2011, 14:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by biffer

don't strip them down till you need to, mig the skeg back on but put wet clothes over the gearbox and down the exhaust, stainless exhaust elbows are £500 each, water pump is below the fuel and water strainer, take the pump off, 2 x 17mm bolts and 2 x hoses, much easier, filters from motor factors, one of my boats had 2.5k hrs on her without any major stuff and i think she's still going strong, if you can get at the turbo oil feed pipe change it for a teflon one or clean it out, if you don't use good oil you get carbon build up in it and it will starve the turbo, pop!, just to rub it in i have 3 spare legs laying around over here

Biffer, if you see a blue Range Rover outside your place and the spare legs are gone ..... it wasn't me ..... could be a loooooooong drive to Sydney Australia though.

I wish we could get spare drives here. I guess the long term aim would be to do that and probably need to source them from over there.

Thank you so much for the tips, will let you know how I go.

kubcat · 18 June 2011, 22:27

Biffer, or anyone else for that matter, would you be interested in selling me a complete drive?

biffer · 19 June 2011, 08:00

Yes. As my boat is up for sale I won't need them as standbys. Get me a  07946330001

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Dry Run · 19 June 2011, 08:57

Hi,
FYI I sold (through our brokerage) a Ribtec 890 SX for export to Papua New Guinea. It is likely, that this is the boat we sold. It belonged to a guy who kept it with us on the Dry Stack for several years. If you need to know any of it's service history and background, then let me know. BTW, has it still got a frog motif on the rear of the tubes?

kubcat · 19 June 2011, 10:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dry Run

Hi,
FYI I sold (through our brokerage) a Ribtec 890 SX for export to Papua New Guinea. It is likely, that this is the boat we sold. It belonged to a guy who kept it with us on the Dry Stack for several years. If you need to know any of it's service history and background, then let me know. BTW, has it still got a frog motif on the rear of the tubes?

It certainly still has the frog. I imagine there are not too many 890 SX's exported to Papua New Guinea with a frog motif, so this must be the boat.

Anything you can tell me about the boat would be most appreciated. Waiting to find time to give it some maintenance and for some warmer weather in Sydney to take it out.

I love rib.net, it is amazing what you find.

Dry Run · 19 June 2011, 11:46

I'll send you the photos we have of the boat when we were selling it. It will be interesting to see if it's changed much. The new owners were going to get a bimini made for it - wonder if that ever happened? Frog motif is unique to that boat (previous owners nickname was "froggy") so it must be the one. As they say - small world!

I'll PM you the history of the boat as we know it, but suffice to say that it was always well maintained and serviced - although not always loved!

Anyway, have fun with her!

Oh and the dials and guages you've ordered from me will certainly fit that rib as we have already supplied the ignitions on it from the same stock.