Viking 48 vs Cabo 48

Operating costs should be very very similar. They're both quality boats and built well. The only difference is that the CATS tend to be cheaper to maintain then the MAN's. I would go with a 48' Cabo over a 47' if possible because the hull has been updated and it has a larger fuel capacity. Buy whatever fits your needs.

This is a good thread. They both have the same 1,100 hp MANs, which makes me shudder... 10 years ago, a 48 foot boat with 1,100 hp would have been classified a "Cigarette". Mega power on a mid-size boat. The Viking weighs almost 10,000 lbs ore, but has relatively the same cruising speed...

I am a Viking lover but in this case I say go Cabo! Chase after dem big dawgs! Cabo builds a fine boat.

Not personally familiar with the 54 Bert (which I've heard is a good boat), but my experience with newer 51's and 46's says go with the Viking. I think I'd also go with the Mans over the Cats.

Why MANs over CAT? What I understand is that the maintenance costs and parts availability are considerable higher and more difficult to obtain for the MANs. Not that familiar with the OP location of Lafayette, LA, but CAT service people may be easier to come by. Especially if out in the Louisianna Gulf and the OP may have to limp into a shrimping port for help.

You're right about the location. Hadn't considered that. I do like Cats, especially their Johnny-on-the-spot service, but they're also known for pushing motors out unready to fulfill contracts (of which they have many). In other words I think they're stretched a little thin. Some of the Cats I've worked with burned a fair amount of oil (up to 2 or 3 qts. in an 8 hour day) and I've had 2 clients who's motors siezed because of defects known to the company, but they had to fulfill the contracts. Granted they were fast at swapping out the motors, but I haven't seen these problems with Mans. Service is a problem with Mans though, but where I live so is any diesel service.

They don't call them MAN GRENADES for nothing. I've seen many MAN's blow up, including several common rails less then a year old, you just don't hear about them. Cat has had their share of problems, but they go out of their way to cover ANYTHING that has blown up and give a nice extended warranty. MAN will try to find a reason why it is not covered under warranty. Like the high pressure fuel line that would blow on 1050's and 1300's and they're just out of warranty........"however we have an "upgraded part" to replace them. Have had LOTS of them blow. Use 1 quart of non-delvac oil in a MAN and it's warranty is void....have 1 quart too much oil in it and the warranty is void.........regardless if the boat is in the Bahamas or whatever. CAT service is worldwide as are parts, and warranty coverage is next to none. I've seen CAT air freight heavy parts to cover warranty repairs to third world countries.......fly tech's all over the world to cover warranty repairs...... The only time I've had CAT's ever use oil was if they didn't recieve their first oil change at 50 hours like it says in the manual. CAT uses a lighter break-in oil, and many people miss where it says to change at 50hrs and they wait until 250hrs.

I've also seen several MAN/Rex Roth controls go bad, they're not very waterproof. If installed in an exposed, flybridge installation, they'll eventually short out. I've never seen a set of CAT/Sturdy controls go bad.......

I personally would NEVER buy a Sportfish with pre-common rail MANS in it if you do much trolling. At trolling speeds, especially the motors that cut out cylinders, they are SOOOOOO fumy/smelly that you will DIE if you spend an hour in the cockpit...combined with the black smoke when you get on plane.......uuuuuuggghhh.. 800's, 1050's, and 1300's......The harmonics of them also DO NOT raise fish......I trolled a 57' Bertram for 7 days straight with 1300's and that boat would NOT raise fish......Same for a 45' Cabo with 800 MAN's. I have run a 45 CABO with C18's and that combo, I had Marlin eating the teasers......even if they were a foot out of the water.......

No direct experience but I seem to remember a guy who hired a plane with a banner to fly over the FL boat show last year.

As I recall, the sign did not say nice things about Viking and Mans. I would think you would have to be pretty unhappy to do such a thing.

Another avenue is to find an older 54' Bertram SF (or similar) with tired Detroits, and have a new set of CAT's installed and ride out with full warranties and engines that will probably last you the life of the boat. I wouldn't be afraid of something with Detroits either as long as they're the 71 series. A set of C18 cats in a 54' Bertram SF, the boat would fly. I ran one with 12v71's TI's (hardtop) with 4600 hours without rebuilding them and the boat ran 30 knots at 1950 rpms........Cat's would probably cruise the same boat around 36 knots.......maybe more.

As for the Cabo's and Vikings not having CAT's they both heavily installed the pre-common rail MAN's from 98-2002. MAN was offering great incentives to manufacturers, the HP to weight ratio was higher then the CAT's then and fuel consumption a little less and a little more speed. But, you'll still see some CAT boats if you look......That was until they started seeing a LOT of problems with the MANs, also a lot of complaints about the rough running at trolling speeds, maintenance costing 3x the CAT's, black soot, and fumes. There was then a MASS exodus towards CAT's when the C series came out and you'll see most all of the Vikings and Cabo's from 2002-2005 have primarily CAT's.......until the common rail Man's came out and that's sort of leveled the playing field.........

3412's are good motors. Cat has been using that block since 1978. The 3412's usually make 1350hp I believe, and they are what was turned into the C30 with a little larger turbo and fuel injectors and this'es and that's. But my CAT guys say the 3412 is a pretty bullet proof motor. I've run them, they run clean, idle nicely, are dependable and have no oil leaks. They essentially run exactly like a C30 with a little less HP, but have lots of low end torque.

Hi,

Where do you get some of this stuff that you post from?

In my experience the Oil used at the 50 Hr service is the same oil used second and third service and so on.

If you were so knowledgeable about CATS you would also know that not all the engine family have an oil change at 250 Hrs- some have extended intervals and all have fuel burnt and time limits regardless of hours run.

The oil CAT uses at 0 hours is a lighter "break-in" oil. When you change it at 50 hours, you use the standard 15w-40w CAT oil to change it. Yes, some cats go 500 hours or rarely 1000 hours for a normal oil change if they're equipped with the optional larger oil pan which most yachts are rarely equipped with. You still have to do S.O.S. at 250 hrs and that determines how often it should be changed with the larger pan. CAT also does recommend it being changed according to fuel burn, instead of hours but many CAT's equipped in yachts don't have a fuel burn recording on the display. Until you get into 2003 or newer with the lcd displays. Even some newer yachts like Searay and Azimut to name a few rarely install the cat displays.....Mainly because they have such limited dash space. so the only way you'd know the fuel burn would be for a CAT mechanic to plug his computer in. Again, most yachts would end up changing it due to the time schedule instead of fuel burn or engine hours.

Hi,

CATS are test run in the factory and or by the delivering dealer when required to prove performance for Class Rules.

The Oil is drained and the engines are shipped dry after this. Unless there is a problem they will not be near 50 hrs run by the time they are delivered and installed.

From my experience the Oil that goes in before first run onboard is the same as what goes into it each time after that.

As for fuel burn, in my days as an Engineer at sea we used to prepare a thing called Midday Report, the figures on this included the amount of fuel burnt in the preceding 24 hrs long before there were any electronics on the engines other than alarm switches.

Even on your sportfish boats you must surely know how much fuel you are putting in the tank, take a note of the engine hours since the last refill and you will have an average per hour burn rate with the total amount of fuel going in being the total burnt. You can adjust the totals to extract the genset uses if you take a note of the average load and use the fuel consumption figure given for the lb/hp per hr or grams per kWh. Again knowing how many hours it has run are quite important in calculating this figure.

As I can't seem to find it would you care to enlighten us all as to exactly what this wondrous oil is?

I sea trialed a Viking and a Cabo of the dsame size (45 or 46 as I recall) back to back on the same day for the client of a dealer here on the West coast of Florida a while back.

And while the Cabo had the better engine room layout, the Viking had the better and drier ride.

As to operating costs, given the same engines, same equipment, I can't see where there would be any real difference.

The CAT engines are installed into each vessel, not by the yacht manufacturer but by a Caterpillar dealer. Ringhaven CAT does all of the Hatteras Installs for example. The break in oil is a 30w special application oil part # 170-5262, and is added to the engine by the installing dealer and the oil dipsticks are then also marked appropriately by the dealer (they are not marked full and add by the CAT factory) and is to be changed per caterpillar maintenance manual at 50 hours of run time IN THE VESSEL. All engines are test run by the installing CAT dealer in the vessel. If the manufacturer ships their vessels on it's own bottom, and are test run with the computers on to measure all vital pressures as well as proper load/rpm before it is shipped to the dealer. If the vessel is shipped by truck, like Cabo does, it is done by the local CAT dealer where the vessel is launched. This is called an engine startup. I have done 100's of these on new Cats, MANs, and DD/MTU as well as a handful of Cummins. Cat just hooks up the laptop, while with the mans the computer is not smart enough to do that and they have to hook up all kinds of manual gauges.

While in a perfect world, it would be great if everyone took a log for fuel burn and engine hours, in the yachting industry it never happens. Also, pleasure yachts are rarely run at the same rpm's all day all of the time, so average burn changes with each trip. Very Very few people record this.

Hi,

CAPTJ - Please stop posting misleading generalisations about subjects where you only have a rudimentary knowledge at best.

The Special Application Oil Part No 170 5262 is specially made for the Cat 3116 and 3126 Marine Engines with mechanical unit injectors. It is a 30W Monograde Oil and is not to be used in any other engines. It is not just for running in but for normal operations. The part No you give rfers to a 1 US Gal package of this oil. You can actually use the appropriate multi grade oil for the ambioent temp of operation in these engines if you do not return the crankcase vent line to the turbo inlet.

I am involved in the yacht building industry, on the yachts I deal with the builder install the Engines not the Dealers in cases I am familiar with.

CAT Publish a book called Installation Guidelines which will tell you the technical data needed for this. The builder should have people with the know how to do the rest. That's why they are called Boat/Yacht Builders isn't it?

The marking of the dipstick when the correct amount of Oil has been added is called Calibrating the dip stick, don't make too much of a cut or file too deep in the face or you will not be the first one to find that your dipstick is shorter than you need one day.

Test running and witnessing of this by Owners Reps and Class Surveyors is known as Factory Acceptance Tests.

Test running the finished boat to test and record the operating parameters is known as a Sea Trial.

I don't know where you are located, but here in the U.S. most builders do not install their own engines. I know for a fact that Hatteras, Cabo, and Viking have the CAT dealer install and align their engines. All 3 manufacturers as well as the CAT dealers, call it an engine start up. Because they are there when the engine is started up, and you then take the vessel on a sea trial to complete the engine startup and test the operating parameters underway after the initial startup has been done. The computer checks the sensors before the engine is started, operating pressures and so forth are checked. I have done hundreds of these for the Cabo factory. I have also spent over a week at the Hatteras plant and oversaw the delivery of several Hatteras'. Smaller builder's may install their own, that I have no idea about. Large builder's in the US do not, they would rather the liability of something not being installed properly fall under the engine manufacturer's dealer.

The installing dealer scribes the dipstick with the proper amount of oil, because the dipstick level will be different on each yacht depending on the angle that the engine is mounted. I have not and do not scribe dipsticks. I do know how it is done. According to the CAT manual you drain the oil by the drain plug, add a certain amount of oil (each engine requires a different amount), run the engine, let it sit for 5 minutes, check the dipstick and then mark the ADD amount. Then add another specified amount and mark the full mark.

CAT does indeed use a lighter oil when it is first filled and it is not the standard 15w-40 or 5w-40 that is called for under normal operating conditions. Considering that CAT has different types of oil for different Hemisphere's, they may do something completely different where you are located, but that is what they do HERE.