1984 Starwind 27 w/Westerbeke 10 Two

[JeTexas]

Hello, everyone.

I’m from Houston, Texas and my brother and I picked up a long-neglected 1984 Starwind 27 in July of 2009. The name on the paperwork at the marina was Photo Finish, but any evidence of the name ever being on the stern is long gone.
It’s a full-keeled vessel with an inboard Westerbeke 10 Two that has not run in a very long time.

From what I can tell the original owners were big into racing and had it all rigged up with lots of extra blocks and pulleys, and it has two spinnaker poles. However, I think they kind of wore out the boat and upsized, selling it to the previous owners who had every intention of fixing it up, but who went about it in the wrong order and then lost interest. For instance, they installed all new standing and running rigging but never got around to fixing the diesel, so it just sat for years as the “new” running rigging rotted away.

Now, I don’t know what prompted them to rewire the bilge pump, but at some point they did. Unfortunately they wired it with twist-on connectors like you’d use in a ceiling fan, and an inline car fuse. Needless to say, the bilge pump was not working by the time we got the boat. At some point the cockpit drains rotted out and turned the boat into a bathtub. All of the access panels, the galley cabinet, and the cabin sole were completely rotted.

The good news was, there was no damage from Hurricane Ike as we’d seen in most of the boats we’d looked at. The hull has no blisters although we do need to treat some delamination where the keel meets the hull when we have it hauled for a bottom job this summer.

I’ve spent the past six months reworking the electrical systems and cutting new access panels and walls. We began trouble shooting the Westerbeke just before Christmas. The antifreeze in the freshwater system had turned into a crystallized gel of some sort, and the starter was seized. Once I had stripped and rebuilt the starter, we found that one cylinder of the injection pump was seized. Once I stripped and rebuilt the injection pump, we found that our injectors were shot. This week we had a diesel shop rebuild the injectors, and we’ll see if she finally starts this weekend.

The Teleflex control cables had also cracked and seized, so we’re in the process of replacing those. We were holding off on buying new ones until the diesel was running because we didn’t want to spend the money on new ones if we ended up having to change motors and needed a different length.

The boom was not on the boat when we bought it. It had been disassembled for paint and was in the previous owner’s garage. I got it painted and back on the mast, but I’m still sorting out which cleat and blocks screw onto it where.
The boat came with a main sail, a storm jib and a spinnaker. I just finished changing out all the seized hanks on the jib, and we bought two halyards. Either this weekend or next weekend we’re going to try to rig the main and the jib. As I’m still a sailing novice, I’m not concerned with the spinnaker yet.

It’s been a fun project, but I’m ready to get out on the water. Hopefully we’ll be sailing by March.
There’s another Starwind 27 named Grace as well as a 23 in our Marina.

Here’s some photos of the project that I’ve got over at cruisersforum.com
http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/mem ... ms419.html

[DockMaster]

Welcome to the Marina....

I checked out your pictures. They are fascinating. The Westerbeke is in rough conditon. If you have not found them, here is the links for some of the Westerbeke Info http://www.marinedieseldirect.com/weste ... lcome.html (Parts page) and http://www.westerbeke.com/Products/OldM ... ne&Group=2 with a PDF for the engine here http://www.westerbeke.com/productBrochures/w10_two.pdf.

I ran a Westerbeke 8k GenSet for 12 years and loved the engine. The install was not the best when she developed a weak number three cycliner. Teleflex Red Jacket controls are easy to work and you can get the parts at a large West Marine store. I had to change out the little red connector at the engine more often Than I thought I should. It may have been the angle of the install. I would guess you know your local west Marine store quite well by now.

Also you might want to download the Nineteen Rigging manual ftp://ftp.starwinds.com/ftp-pub/ for the parts list in the back. It may help you with some of the hardware parts. Wellcraft used the same fittings across the boats. The faucet is the same as in the Nineteen but it is not longer manufactured. Some of the hardware is also out of production but Schaffer and Harken can give you the newer model with the old parts numbers. I don't know if the boom fittings are the same. On the 22 they are but I am not sure they are on the 223. I have not sailed a 27 since about '94 and I can not remmember for sure. It looks like you have found RV World which has some good parts for the cabin.

Again Welcome....

[JeTexas]

After way too many weekends of effort put into the Westerbeke just to get it to the point where we could turn it over and attempt to start it, we finally called it a loss and yanked it. I bought a salvage Phasor (BetaZ482 clone) and a new Kubota Z482. We just finished moving all the marinized parts, mounts, transmission, etc. over to the new Kubota and installed it last weekend. I still have to go back this week to hook up the fuel lines, cooling hoses and exhaust system, but we're getting close.

In the meantime I had a guy in diesel mechanic school offer us a working British Seagull Century 100 for the decrepit Westerbeke. I'd been trying to sell it or part it out for a couple weeks with no interest at all, so we took the trade and put an outboard mount on the transom for the Seagull. Part of me hated to mar the clean stern with a mount, but the utilitarian side of me won out. It never hurts to have a back-up plan, and now the boat shall never sit for another 10 years.

We took a quick trip out Sunday evening. We only put up the main sail as we hadn't cut sheets for the jib yet, but she handled very nicely. I can't wait to get back out this weekend.