Our new (old) vessel is equipped with a 24hp Bukh twin cylinder. Due to
incorrect wiring to the battery isolation switches we accidentally flattened
all the batteries on the weekend and were forced to handstart.

My old boat had a Volvo engine that was decompressed by lifting a lever on
the side of the engine, hand crank then throw the lever and away she went.
Easy as could be.

As far as I can tell, this engine (the Bukh) has a spring loaded lever at
the front of the engine that you must hold down with one hand while trying
to turn the engine over with the other. Damn difficult to do and it's
extremely difficult to get spinning with only one hand free. Even with a
second person holding down the lever it's bloody hard to get it spinning.

Is this simply brought about by the size of the engine (the Vovlo would have
been half the size) or am I doing something wrong ?

Hopefully someone out there can give me some advice.

All the best

TDW

My Bukh DV20 didn't have any spring on the handle, so the one time I
tried it, I just reached up and flipped the lever back once the motor
was spinning and it started right up. Is there any way to put a bungee
on the lever, and then release it once you have it turning over?
John

tdw wrote:
Our new (old) vessel is equipped with a 24hp Bukh twin cylinder. Due to
incorrect wiring to the battery isolation switches we accidentally flattened
all the batteries on the weekend and were forced to handstart.

My old boat had a Volvo engine that was decompressed by lifting a lever on
the side of the engine, hand crank then throw the lever and away she went.
Easy as could be.

As far as I can tell, this engine (the Bukh) has a spring loaded lever at
the front of the engine that you must hold down with one hand while trying
to turn the engine over with the other. Damn difficult to do and it's
extremely difficult to get spinning with only one hand free. Even with a
second person holding down the lever it's bloody hard to get it spinning.

Is this simply brought about by the size of the engine (the Vovlo would have
been half the size) or am I doing something wrong ?

Hopefully someone out there can give me some advice.

All the best

TDW

I'm sure that I'll be able to work out some method of holding it down but I
can't quite work out the logic behind the spring mechanism.
The engine in my boat (DV 24 is the model) is a developement of the DV 20.
The extra four HP coming from a redesigned injection system. They should
therefore be pretty similar.
Two questions for you, where was the lever mounted on the DV20 ? and how
much grunt did you need to turn the thing over ?
Thanks for your imput.
TDW
wrote in message
oups.com...
My Bukh DV20 didn't have any spring on the handle, so the one time I
tried it, I just reached up and flipped the lever back once the motor
was spinning and it started right up. Is there any way to put a bungee
on the lever, and then release it once you have it turning over?
John

tdw wrote:
Our new (old) vessel is equipped with a 24hp Bukh twin cylinder. Due to
incorrect wiring to the battery isolation switches we accidentally
flattened
all the batteries on the weekend and were forced to handstart.

My old boat had a Volvo engine that was decompressed by lifting a lever
on
the side of the engine, hand crank then throw the lever and away she
went.
Easy as could be.

As far as I can tell, this engine (the Bukh) has a spring loaded lever at
the front of the engine that you must hold down with one hand while
trying
to turn the engine over with the other. Damn difficult to do and it's
extremely difficult to get spinning with only one hand free. Even with a
second person holding down the lever it's bloody hard to get it spinning.

Is this simply brought about by the size of the engine (the Vovlo would
have
been half the size) or am I doing something wrong ?

Hopefully someone out there can give me some advice.

All the best

TDW