Harley 42'

Lee,

Excellent visit - wish I didnt have to run off to work. Funny you sent this message - I am having trouble finding anyone willing to haul my Harley 15 miles south to the closest do it yourself marina so I can swap out the engines and do maintenance on the drives and bottom. Had a guy lined up and he baled out.....worried about pulling such a big boat at a ramp. No one else seems interested unless THEY do the repair work.

Only other option is a 30 mile boat ride on one engine and without power steering while trying to avoid mega yacjts on the new river or a megabuck tow. I'll pay for gas and dinner Bro if you are around to haul it one way for me......I'll be driving it home You know my number if you can swing it.

 

When are you back in Florida Bro? I might need a tow pretty soon.

 

Should be limping along soon - took some running FWC bone-stock Mercruiser454s with nice 72C 1.5:1 gears and cleaned them up, fixed a few minor things with my Dad's assistance over the last month, adding my Gil exhausts (and soon - chrome spark arrestors) from my busted POS 502s. Shw wont be fast but hopefully it'll get us fishing, diving, partying, and grilling again while I save my pennies to rebuild the 502s gassers or upgrade to diesel.

anyway - a before and after shot for posterity. Now all I need to do is drive it to a DIY marina or get it pulled at a ramp. Keep you posted.

 

Key West Harley

Does anyone know about the Center Console for sale in Key West?
Sounds interesting, a center console!

 

center console

I sent a reply yesterday but must have got lost. I have seen the center console many times & been on it but not @ sea. It is a very clean boat with a bunch of neat features. It has a sizeable cabin with head for overnite, lots of rod stoage, big platform, nice large enclosre. I think it was a charter dive/fish and had same owners for perhaps 20 years. It has the cat 3126-420hp engines, same as I have in my Harley. I think they are great. If these owners used it a lot they proably got out the bugs. It is a beast of a CC compared to most big outboard CC's but probably uses less fuel than most outboard CC's. I think the diesel/arneson set up is far superior to outboards and will outlast them by a long shot. As with any used boat (especially a harley) you want to check them closely but this rig could literally last a lifetime. Mine is almost 25 years old and I use it hard and it shows no signs of letting up. Good luck if you try to buy it. LEE

 

Hi, thanks for the information.
I am not familiar with these arneson drives at all, always had straight shafts, but am familiar with the 3126, in my current 34 crusader, just sold.
Since you seem to be VERY familiar with these boats, what should I look at, and into? Will try to find a surveyor, but wish to more know about these drive systems. any info would be much appreciated.

 

Engine and trans direction in Harleys

Tried to post this earlier and it didnt "stick".

I am replacing gas engines that are one regular rotation and one counter rotating. I am putting in two regular rotation engines and one has a gear that changes the rotation for the prop.

Question is.....do I spin the props outward and why?

 

Swamp,
I posted back about a year ago about prop swings. It seems that most guys swing their arneson props in & that is the cause of the big rooster tail. I did it for 15+ years and was Ok with it. For whatever reason, after a prop re-furb I switched to outswinging props, I guess just to try it. I have not switched back. The rooster tail is mainly gone, unless I trim up @ hi-speed & I think my bow behaves better. Keep in mind that between engines & lightening the boat I was up around 50mph and this casued the bow to porpoise, like a light fast outboard. Now it stays down and is easier to control. I ran this by Ken Martin @ pacific surface drives (who I consider to be one of the best arneson guys around) and he said his experience was that V hulls performed better with outswing and cats were better with inswings. I am not sure that all arneson guys would agree but then again most arneson applications are different than ours. By use of the trannys (1 fwd & 1 reverse) I would try with outswing first, run for a while and make some notes of speed & rpm. Then switch the props and try it. Hopefully I will be back in FLA soon and could pull you up on my trailer for the switch. My experience is trial and error, there aint no book on it.
TREASURE,
The arnesons are very neat drives. They might be more maintenance than a shaft drive, but then again they do so much more. They run in shallow water and can trim up to run in REAL shallow water. Also the trim allows you to change the behavior of the boat in different sea conditions and/or load, in addition to trim tabs. Plus they allow you to trailer with ease. I can load/unload my 42' in less time than most 25'. Some of that comes with 20+ years exp. & nice trailer, but still it aint hard. This has been huge for me. I have home in FLA, Ocean City Md. & on Chesapeake Bay. If I could not trailer I would not have my boat with me near as much. It might not mean much to you if you stay in 1 place. If you are slightly mechanically inclined you can drop off an arneson and make minor/major repairs in a day. Most major bearings come from any bearing shop @ reasonable prices, not like a Merc drive where you gotta go to a dealer. There are very few moving parts. Check out some arneson web-sites. Like I mentioned before the early harley's had a bunch of bugs from poor construction and rigging. But if someone with knowledge owns one for long you usually work out the bugs or sell it. You just can't use it much until the bugs are gone. Hopefully the CC you are lookin at has been debugged (or de-harleyed). Howard Harley really was ahead of his time. If you look at big expensive performance boats today especially on a world wide basis you will find the same set up, hi-perf. diesels & arnesons (magnum, Sunseeker, etc.) properly set up they are bullet proof. Part of harley's problems were his own doing, but part of it was that there was not a light weight hi perf diesel available back in the 80's so he used some "hopped up" modified versions that people told him would work (Merlin) but didn't. Not his fault, but when the engines broke on a $250,000 new boat, owners blamed him. Now the engines are available. The Cats in the CC weigh only about 1350 lbs. and got 420 hp. and they are proven! I think the drive train in that CC is outstanding provided it has been properly installed and maintained. Evaluating the rest of the vessel would be similar to an eval on any vessel. Imortant to check fiberglass laminates and stringers on a harley. If you like what you see and it is priced right you might really enjoy the boat. Keep in mind that this is a narrow beam boat. If you are used to 12'+ beams, this will be different. For me it works great and any sacrifices given to beam are made up in the trailerability. If you aint gonna trailer, consider the beam. Good luck.

 

Thanks Lee - good stuff Bro

 

Hey Harley Guys/Gals - a wierd question for you:

I am replacing engines and redoing the sh!tty bolted down into the stringer type engine mounts. I hear the boat runs better if you shift the weight of the engines rearward and frankly more room forward of the engines would be great for servicing etc.....is there any reason to have a two-foot long drive shaft between the engine transmissions and the arnesons?

Does anyone have the motor connected directly to the arnesons? Any issues/problems?

Pros and cons?

Thanks!

 

drive shafts

Swamp,
I thought that one of the functions of the drive shaft was to "cushion" the fixed drvie/transom from the engine movements that occur when running. My driveshafts are 2 piece with a spline and they can move in & out like a shock absorber. As we know the arneson drive is bolted directly to the transom which does not move (or aint supposed to) whereas the engine is mounted on rubber vibration/shock absorbing mounts to help reduce vibration in the vessel. I have noted that while underway (especially in rough conditions) the engines do a fair amount of moving & shaking. If the engine/tranny were mounted directly to the drive (without a splined shaft) all of that movement would be transferred to the drive and/or transom. I would think that this could severely damage the transom or the driveline in the arneson. I don't know this info from any source other than my own experience. Hope someone else could chime in with their thoughts.
I just found out that my insurance will increase by over $2,000 if I leave the boat in Fla. during hurricane season (6-30 thru 11-1). In addition my storage would be over $1,000 for that period. For $3,000 I can trasnport to Md. & back to Fl. Plus I will have use of boat all summer and maybe tackle that Awlgrip job this fall. That being said I will be back down soon & will likely be bringing good mechanic with me. Hoping to see you, maybe with your boat up & running! Will be in touch. Lee

 

Thanks - that makes sense. I have a two foot shaft (yeah I'm braggin) with a u-joint on each end. Guess I'll either get them shortenned to move the engines back or leave it alone this time around.

Give me a call when you are coming into town and we can grab a beer

My one running engine managed to fail on me last weekend when I tried to prepare it to get the boat to the boat ramp....it was a series of things one would expect from a boat that has sat around for 18 months...impeller blew & I replaced, batteries died & I replaced, Carb flooded the engine so had to do a rebuild and change the oil/gas mixture in the block.....you get the idea. With mothers day I ran out of time.... So she is still floating in the back yard. Will try again this weekend to get her out on the hard. Replacement engines are ready to go.

Cheers!

 

Don't ...

The drive line allows for the expansion and contraction of the distance between the engine and the transom during use. Hence the slip joint in the drive line. The transom flexes under way, the engine and gear box change in temperature and there is some thermal expansion along with flexing that must be addressed for a successful application.

Also, alignment is addressed via the drive line itself. The crosses allow a certain amount of offset in them allowing and engine to be placed in various spots depending upon the restrictions of the package.

Mind you, one does not have to have the same length as you noted but you will need a drive line with a "cross" at each end with a reasonable amount of slip in the shaft.

The shortest one we make is (input shaft to transmission flange) 7ish inches. We have one at 10.25" and of course the standard 17" + lengths.

 

Thanks Rik - hope you are well - been a while since I have seen you post. Appreciate the info

 

How is everyone?

Well I finally pulled the trigger on a bow thruster. It's a LEWMAR 185TT 4.0 HP, 129 lbs thrust unit. It should be here in a couple of days. I'm looking forward to getting started on the install. Now I'll be able to get in and out of thoses tricky marinas without yelling at my inept crew! I've looked over Lee's pictures. Hopefully it will come out as clean as an install as his.

I am taking the Harley upstream through the gorge to Kennewick, WA the last week of July. Then if the boat survives the trip unhurt. I will load it on the trailer and take it up to San Juan Island in the Northern Puget Sound and leave it there for the remander of the season.

Hey swamp, how is the engine install coming? Remember I have a few sets of props for you to try when you get to that stage. I know the one set would not slide on to your prop shaft. But I bet that you could get them on with minimal mods. I think all you would have to do is slightly ream the inside of the prop or just take some emery cloth to your shafts. I have three sets of props. I;m sure at least one set would work. Those 454s need to reach at least 4400 rpms. Otherwise you are overloading them. I have a set of 18X21 3bs old style choppers that perform excellent. The only reason I swapped them out is the fact that they are noisey. I still have the 17X20.5 4bs Ellis props that won't work for me. But I think they would for you. .
As far as moving the engines back. It may or may not make much of a difference. The gas engines are not that heavy in realation to the overall weight of the boat. But it would'nt hurt anything for sure. Especially since you want more room in front of the engines for maintainence etc. Here is a pic of my engines after they were moved back to give you an idea as to the amount of room I have in the front of them.

Steve