Westerbeke Oil Drain Hose: "what the..."

[Warren S]

OK, It's time to change the oil and it will be the first time I'll be doing so on this engine. With these black rubber drain hoses that are permanently attached to the oil pan (I assume, I can't get a good angle to actually see it), is the objective to attach a hand pump to this? or set a container in the bilge, unplug the hose and let 'er rip?

Or: Is this a fitting done by the PO, and y'all are wondering what the heck I'm talking about?

[Anthony P. Jeske]

Warren:
I wedge an empty gallon milk jug in the bilge and let the oil drain into that while I sip a cool one in the cockpit. Remember to run the engine first so the oil flows faster.
Way better than sucking the oil out through the dipstick tube!
Regards,
Tony Jeske
CD-28 #365
NO REGRETS
San Diego

[Warren S]

That's what i thought. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing part of some oil removal system. think I can handle the 'cool one' step.

[satu]

On my CD27 Westerbeke 13, the oil drain hose is too short to accommodate a direct gravity discharge. I run the engine for a few minutes and use a small brass(I believe) hand pump to slurp the oil into a plastic gallon container.

I use a few wraps of electrical tape on the pump/engine hose connection to get an air tight seal and prevent leakage.

Craig Urquhart
CD27 Satu #272
Brunswick, Me

[Steve Kuhar]

Warren,

If you get one of the oil change pumps that West Marine sells (I use model 3704574, but I think any of them will work) and then get a standard male air line fitting (the piece that fits into the air tool, not the quick disconnect) you can thread the fitting directly into where the pipe plug is at the end of the drain hose. Make sure that you elevate the drain hose above the crankcase to prevent leaks. The hose that comes on the oil change pump will neatly slip over the air line fitting. I enlarged the hole in the fitting for even faster results, but as stated earlier, if you warm up the oil first everything will work smoothly with no mess whatsoever.

Now, if anybody has any ideas other than the baggie trick for changing the filter I would sure like to hear it.

Steve Kuhar

[Andy Denmark]

As I "attained maturity" (how do ya' like that, OJ?), one of the really tough jobs on Rhiannon, with her Westerbeke 13, was changing the oil. After draining the oil & replacing the filter I looked like someone had thrown an angry cat at me -- scratched all to hell and black from all the spilled oil. The entire exercise had to be done by braille!

A few episodes of"Adventures in Changing Oil", I decided something had to be done. First I called Westerbeke and they said there was a kit to remote the oil filter so I parted with a couple of boat units and lo, it was a done deal. Now the oil filter (larger) is within easy reach just under the sink. Next, I went to West Marine and bought one of the little 12 volt oil change pumps. It was simple to cut the fitting off the drain hose and attach it with a clamp to the pump, now mounted on the port blkhd. I wired said pump to 12 volts and the oil change process is now greatly simplified. This was 10 years ago.

The one remaining problem is checking the oil. Since I do this religiously prior to every first-of-the-day engine start the magnitude of this seemingly simple operation can't be appreciated unless you have actually tried it. Talk about braille! Another call to Westerbeke was no help. I thought they might have an accesory or extension that would simply this mundane problem. No such luck. FWIW, I have gotten rather good at this. It only took twenty or so years but now it's an easy job. I'd really like to know if there's a solution to this.

I vote in favor of the oil change pump and the filter extension kit.

While we're on this subject here's a thought I continue to ponder. The orientation of the oil pan on the W-13 is such that the drain fitting is some what higher than the lowest point of the pan so that all the oil doesn't get drained. The deepest part of the pan if the engone were sitting level would be near the front. Turning the pan 180 degrees would solve this problem. The mounting bolt pattern is the same either way so gasket would work fine. What would be the ramifications of doing this? Instead of leaving probably 6 ozs of oil unchanged every time you'd get most of it out. Sure, the oil pickup tube is at the front of the engine but it would be easy to shorten that by 2 inches of so --- or would it??? what would be the implications of shortening the pickup tube? Anyone have an answer here?
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Yamaha Yzf-R7 History

[Oswego John]

As I "attained maturity" (how do ya' like that, OJ?),

O J sez: Like it? I love it. Especially when one considers the alternative.

Hi Andy,

Today was the kind of day in October that one writes home about. It was (still is) a clear, crisp, sunny day in the mid sixties with very little breeze. A perfect day for varnishing.

I just finished building a cross hatched grate for the pointy end of the schooner Ontario. It will cover the bow sprit's attachment. It is so heavy that I move it around with my front end loader. It is constructed of 4 1/2" x 3 3/4" mahogany stock. The monster is over six feet wide aft and a bit more than two feet at the forw'd end.

I started working on it early last spring. It has over sixty four dado joints, (I lose count each time I try to add them up) and lots of half lap joints. Early on in the project, my radial saw went south. I think the trouble is the motor's capacitor start. Bummer. Now what?

Hmmm, adapt and overcome. Where did I hear that, before? So I now make two edge jigs with scrap and c-clamps and proceed to cut over sixty four times two (128) 4 1/2" wide dados by hand with my hand held circular saw. I have a beauty of a world class, rock hard callous on my trigger finger to show for it.

So today I set up for varnishing the monster. I just put my brain in neutral and splashed away. Yes? NO. You asked what we thought about reversing the oil pan on the w-13 engine. I kept thinking about that all afternoon.

While we're on this subject here's a thought I continue to ponder. The orientation of the oil pan on the W-13 is such that the drain fitting is some what higher than the lowest point of the pan so that all the oil doesn't get drained. The deepest part of the pan if the engone were sitting level would be near the front. Turning the pan 180 degrees would solve this problem. The mounting bolt pattern is the same either way so gasket would work fine. What would be the ramifications of doing this? Instead of leaving probably 6 ozs of oil unchanged every time you'd get most of it out. Sure, the oil pickup tube is at the front of the engine but it would be easy to shorten that by 2 inches of so --- or would it??? what would be the implications of shortening the pickup tube? Anyone have an answer here?

O J sez: No, I don't have any answers, but I have lots of questions. A whole afternoon's worth. For instance, if you turned the oil pan end for end and the deep end is now aft, is there enough clearance now where the hull slopes upwards?

With the deep end of the pan forew'd, you can remove all but about 6 ounces of oil which rests at the aft end of the pan, below the oil drain plug. If you were to rotate the pan so that the deep end is now at the low end, the lower deep end has more volume and would allow more than six ounces to remain after an oil drain.

If you rotated the oil pan, the oil filler tube and the oil drain plug would now be on the opposite side of the boat. Would this create any problems?

I don't know about your engine, but usually the deep portion of the oil pan acts like a sump for the screened oil pickup for the oil pump. The pickup has to lay below the crankshaft. If you rotated the pan, would there be adequate room between the crankshaft ant the shallow end of the pan to fit the oil pickup screen?

Suggestion: If and when you remove the oil pan, have a metal tube brazed to the side of the pan at a 45° as far back as possible. The tube should have a screw cap on it. This is one way to be able to remove almost all of the oil at oil change time. It makes it possible to slip the oil change pump intake down to the bottom of the lowest spot of the pan.

Congratulations on overcoming immaturity,
O J

[Andy Denmark]

OJ,

Your idea of brazing a new drain at the lowest point of the oil pan is a good one and has me thinking.

I want to take the engine out anyway to do a total rework of the engine compartment and that would be the time to do the oil pan modification. The hose would be oil resistant (like the hose Westerbeke uses), as the image of the crankcase oil in the bilge doesn't inspire positive thoughts (ahem). Hot oil and rubber don't work well together.

When I went to Westerbeke engine school years ago I found out the W-13 was originally designed as power for a generator. All they did to make the conversion to a marine powerplant was mate it to a transmission. They changed nothing else, thus the oil pan, designed to be at a level configuration, was really not the best suited for the backwards tilt found in most marine installations. But it worked as it was designed and they told me that leaving a small amount of old oil in the pan was really insignificant. My worry, and a question they didn't answer, is the particulate stuff that gathers at the lowest point in any oil pan. The stuff is there - guaranteed - and evidently it doesn't really hurt anything or it would have done so in 1200 hours of operation. I guess I'm being anal here but the idea of sludge and grit in my engine bothers me somewhat.

As for the compartment rework, I am inspired by a Bayfield 32 I delivered. The boat was slow but very comfortable and when the engine was started there was almost no engine noise. The only indication the engine was running was the slight vibration and the sound of water out the exhaust. Looking in the compartment showed it to be tightly enclosed with only a small space around the driveshaft behind the coupling flange. The rest of the compartment was totally lined with soundproofing. Even the galley sink was covered. I was impressed and that's what I'd like to duplicate on Rhiannon.

The engine compartment project is a biggy so it will probably stay as is for awhile. But it never hurts to plan these things as yet another thing to cogitate about when winter (aaargh!) is upon us.
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Halfbaked

[Oswego John]

Hi Andy,

I don't think that using a rubber hose for anything to do with oil is a good idea. Oil and rubber are enemies. The use of neoprene and other such compositions when dealing with oil has solved that breakdown problem.

In regard to brazing a new drain tube, some people attach the supply hose of the oil change pump to a copper tube which is slipped into the new drain tube until it hits the bottom of the pan.

Good luck,
O J

[Andy Denmark]

I am impressed by your bowsprit grating. That sounds like a huge undertaking (ooops, there's a word us old timers should avoid). The question I still ponder is how the ship's carpenter could do such work underway with hand tools and minimum skilled labor. Ditto the ship's sailmaker. When I first opened the sail loft here we got a sail order for a Colvin schooner that was being built at Custom Steel Boats. I forget the size but it was plenty big and we didn't have the floor area in our loft to lay out the sails and cut the cloth -- 10-1/2 oz. bulletproof Dacron. We ended up using the aerobics room floor at the local health club and we barely had room for the mains'l. I remember hoisting those rolls of cloth into the place and thinking of doing this job by hand with water soaked cotton cloth and hand stitching. Think you had a big callous on your finger? Try several hundred yards of hand stitching! We had a devil of a time running this cloth through the heavy duty sewing machine we bought for this (and future) job. It took three people just to run a seam. The needles on this machine were the size of match sticks and the thing would literally sew two pieces of 3/4" plywood together. Think of doing that by hand! Whew!

We had a very old sailmaker here who had sailed all over the world in square riggers. His name was C.C. Culpeper and he was a tiny little guy with sea stories that would enchant anyone who listened. Fascinating person who still did everything by hand. I remember his tales of climbing through the rigging in heavy conditions, hanging from a halyard and taking down torn sails. What he lacked in size he more than made up for in toughness. Those ships took a special breed that seem pretty rare these days.
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Starcraft 2 Replays

[Oswego John]

Andy and all.

[quote Andy D ]
We had a very old sailmaker here who had sailed all over the world in square riggers. His name was C.C. Culpeper and he was a tiny little guy with sea stories that would enchant anyone who listened. Fascinating person who still did everything by hand. I remember his tales of climbing through the rigging in heavy conditions, hanging from a halyard and taking down torn sails. What he lacked in size he more than made up for in toughness. Those ships took a special breed that seem pretty rare these days. [end quote]

Maybe because of gnarly old tars like C.C., the term "Ships of wood, men of steel" was spawned.

I'm going to have lunch today with several men of steel who happen to be in town. One of them has experience transmitting photos via cyber space. I'll ask him if he can send a picture of the grating to the board so y'all can see it. Pictures of the schooner, too.

O J

[Dean Abramson]

Our CD31 came this way, so I can take no credit.

At the lowest point of the oil pan is a fitting with a valve. To the valve is connected a piece of heavy-duty hose (like engine coolant hose) which is about three feet long. On the other end of the hose is a threaded metal fitting, into which threads a metal cap. The metal cap has a nub with a hole in it, in which a metal clip is inserted.

When not in use, the hose loops up, and tucks up through some wire ties (on a bundle of wires running vertically at the forward end of the engine access opening) which have been left just loose enough to accomodate the hose; and the clip on the cap hooks on to another metal hook, which is tightly secured by a wire tie, for good measure. The vast majority of the hose, when stowed thusly, is higher than the top of the oil pan.

To use it, I first warm up the engine, then untuck the hose and run it forward of the drip tray, into the bilge. I remove the cap and stick the hose into a half gallon milk jug, now using the bilge access opening. Using the jug's handle, I tie a line from the jug to something in the cabin. Then I open the valve below the oil pan, and let it drain while I do something else. Man, is it all easy! After a while, I close the valve, but still let the hose drip a bit more. Then I put the cap back on the hose, and stow it till next time. On my engine, once I drain the pan, there is very little oil left in the oil filter, so that part is not messy either.

Now, getting the oil filter off/on means temporarily moving my alternator, but that is no big deal. I think this is because I have a heavy-duty alternator which takes up more space than the stock one did.

This is the easiest, cleanest oil change routine I have ever had on any internal combustion engine I have owned. And on a sailboat, no less! I am not sure how you go about getting the pan with the fitting and valve on it, but it sure is nice.

Dean

[Ben Thomas]

http://www.photoworks.com/photo-sharing ... _pml&cb=PW

With any luck this link will work, it did in the sand box. Anyway here is the oil change pump that came as standard equipment on the Beta Diesels.
It was mounted on the block but I used a longer hose and mounted it on the port bulkhead, now to change oil I just rotate the nozzle inboard and with a gallon jug pump the oil out. Very easy, Since the oil plug in sumps is threaded it would be easy to retrofit on any engine..
Anyone interested in one, PM me for details. Ben

[gonesail]

I remove the cap and stick the hose into a half gallon milk jug, now using the bilge access opening. Using the jug's handle, I tie a line from the jug to something in the cabin. Then I open the valve below the oil pan, and let it drain while I do something else.

I just changed the oil on my westerbeke 21A (new to me) and was not aware of a valve below the oil pan. I figured once you warmed up the engine and removed the cap on the end of the hose then that was enough. maybe that explains why I only got 2.5 gallons out of the engine? I will take a look at this when I get back to the boat. In the meantime can anyone out there confirm the valve and the oil capacity of the 21A? thanks.

[tjr818]

http://www.photoworks.com/photo-sharing ... _pml&cb=PW Ben

Ben I sure am interested, but I cannot get that link to work