This is the follow-up to this blogpost: Preventive Engine Maintenance – Part 1, so you may want to read that one first if you haven’t already. In this post, we’ll look at how the turbo and fuel injector pump rebuild went and how we ended up with two turbo’s instead of one. And we’ll answer the “how much did that set you back?” question as well. Guess what: it wasn’t cheap 😉
Rebuilding the turbo
A pretty straight forward job: having the turbo rebuild. You send the turbo to the company, give them money and they return your now rebuild turbo to you. That’s exactly what we did, and they were happy to take on the job. Of course it was taking them longer than they’d said, but that’s how these things usually go. We patiently waited a while longer until finally, Martijn decided to call them to make sure everything was OK. It wasn’t. The company had gone bankrupt and our turbo was now with the curators.
Can we get our turbo back?
To cut a long and frustrating story short: after several emails and phone calls with the curator, we were told they did indeed have our turbo, and we could get it back. They couldn’t tell us what -if any- work had been done on it or if it was finished. Just that there would be no warranty on whatever work was done, and that it would cost us €550. Excuse me?
Yes, the curator said, there was a €470 invoice attached to our turbo and the curators themselves charged €80 for their work. So – €550 for a turbo that may or may not be of any use to us … Oh, and a pick-up date and time right in the middle of the working day, no other options. Take it or leave it?
How we ended up with two turbo’s
We decided to cut our losses and buy a new turbo. That cost us €960 but hey – at least we’d have a turbo to take back to the boat! Of course, as soon as we’d ordered the new turbo and it was on its way to us, the curator decided he wanted our money more than he wanted an old turbo, so they were suddenly able to send us photo’s of the turbo and they could actually be a little flexible about pickup dates and times as well. Bonus: it also came with a clear invoice listing both hours and parts. Why the heck they didn’t tell us this in any of the previous emails and calls we’ll never know.
We ended up getting our old and rebuild turbo back as well – and paid the €550 invoice. But – at least it’s looking good!
For just €1510 we are now the proud owners of two turbo’s for our Volvo Penta. We aren’t happy about the how and why, but we do love our spare parts … so its all good.
Rebuilding the Fuel Injector Pump & Injectors
This job, luckily, went very well. And we’re very, very happy we brought the fuel pump and injectors home with us to be tested and rebuild, as they needed plenty of new parts to keep them going reliably. Only too often, people will take great care of their engine and maintain it well – but never take out the fuel pump and injectors. Our advise is to take the time – and money – to have them checked and serviced too, to ensure the reliable running of your engine.
Our rebuild fuel injector pump is looking very spiffy, we think 😉 Martijn did the spray paint job himself. He’s a bit annoyed he couldn’t get Volvo Penta Green and had to settle for this regular green but seriously – who’s gonna know?
The total cost of the entire rebuild of the fuel pump and injectors came to €1845. They listed all the parts replaced and work done on the invoice, making it easy for us to see the rebuild was much needed as we thought – and very much worth the effort.
In total, we paid €1510 for both a rebuild and new turbo, and €1845 for the fuel pump, so the entire operation cost us €3355 – excluding the flights, as these are heavy parts and we need to buy checked luggage to bring everything back with us again as well.
Want more detailed information?
I’ve written a Patreon Post about what it cost us to buy our Amel, and I’m working on part 2 which will go in-depth about how much we spent on spare parts, rebuilding parts, marina fees and everything else. You can check out our Patreon Page & Shop for more info – or just join us for free!
