Listers Vs China/ other engine types.

[glort]

Just reading a comment on another thread I don't want to derail, I have been also thinking about the real benefits/ advantages/ merits of Listeroids over the chinese/yanmar etc type engines.

The listers seem to be held in Holy grail like status but after playing with mine and my China/german engines, I'm wondering if they are all they are cracked up to be?
I have come to learn with a few different things that there is the 'Net legend and reputation then there is reality which can be a rather different thing. I'm not trying to put the lister type down, just get a realistic and truthful POV on the things.

One thing I was a bit disappointed with when I got my roid was it was not as quiet as I hoped. The mechanical clatter is more than I would have expected from a slow running water cooled engine. The china diesels I have would wake the dead but they aren't water cooled, they don't need bolting to 10 ton of concrete with all sorts of measures to stop them shaking the house back up the yard apart and they do the same or better power for a fraction of the weight.

The next thing I wonder about is Durability.
The Listers are of course fabled to run a lifetime with just a kind word and a pat on the flywheels every 5 years but in practice, are they really that enduring?  Do/did they all last a lifetime or was that the exception rather than the rule?
Conversely, how do the china diesels like 195's etc last with those that put big hours or run them for many years?

Then there is fuel consumption.
From what I have seen the Listers don't seem to be the exception they once were. I have read of other designs like the Chinese/ yanmar copies getting just as good or certainly in the ball park.

I'm interested to hear thoughts and experiences from people who have and use them in the real world as to their thoughts and experiences.
What do people see as the advantages and drawbacks of the different designs and what do they like or dislike about them?
I understand manufacturing quality is a big variable but I'm interested more in things beyond that and assuming they are all to an equal and decent standard.

Any other prefered types such as Kubotas etc?

[Henry W]

I been around Listers and Listeroids and found that the stories you hear and read about them running long fifty thousand plus maintenance free hours is false. They do have lots of mechanical noise. It is documented on this forum and listerengine.com of actual hours before repairs and overhaul are needed. I was not impressed with them. I was more impressed with the GM-90 6-1. It had a better oiling system, was direct injected and had better fuel efficiency, counter balance weights on crank, more compact, can be set up to run up to 900 RPM's by changing the flywheels. Running up to a 900 RPM's gave it 8 hp. I liked the GM-90 but it took up two much space as like the Listeroids so I sold it.

Next the S195, what a work horse that was. I constantly overloaded it and it did not mind. Yes it was loud but it held together under such abuse. I wish I kept that generator project. With a ST-12 generator head it never had problems starting the heat pump with the we'll pump running.

I built Kubota gensets with the Z482 and the D1005 engines. I must say they are very nice indeed. The D1005 genset project was very quiet and ran like a Swiss watch. The parts are not as expensive like the Yanmar and Cat/Perkins engines so it was not bad servicing it.

One Kubota engine series I love is the EA330, EA300, EB300 and EL300 engines. They are easy to work on and parts are not way out of line. The only thing is they are very pricy new. I been lucky twice finding new ones on line at very low prices. But, it took me over a year to find the EA330. They can be found at times used but as all small used diesels, they are getting harder to find.

One big factor that should be looked at is parts availability in your area. Try to get an engine that is easy to get parts. Kubota, Cat/Perkins, Yanmar, Farymann, are all good high quality engines. Just make sure you can get parts.

If you look around in this forum you will find posts on all the engines I listed.

Henry

[mobile_bob]

a good water cooled s195 changfa will run 20k plus hours with good maintenance, i suspect a good listeroid is probably going to do about the same.

as for fuel economy, the 6/1 will do about 8kw/hrs per gallon (US) of pump diesel, the s195 will produce about 10kw/hrs on the same gallon of fuel (US)... the 1115 has proven to do a bit better at around 11kw/hrs per gallon (US)

yes the chinese diesels are loud as hell, however one can abate a decent portion of the noise by improving the muffler, and using some sort of silencer/resonator on the intake... the gear train is another issue that is a bit more difficult to address.

i know of verified reports of changfa 195's happily running for over 26k hours with moderate maintenance.

there are variants of the chinese engine's that include full pressure lube filtration, those engines of course cost more up front, but i suspect that given good maintenance and the correct oil, clean fuel and air they surely could exceed 30khrs mtbf

i also suspect that the original listers never ran much over 20k hours even with decent maintenance, that is without doing some minor overhaul work along the way to more hours... the reported 100k hrs is likely urban legend based on some rare example of an engine sitting in a light house on some remote island for 50-60yrs having only ran maybe 5k hours but everyone thinks because it is old it must have 100k plus hours on it... or

there might well be a few examples of such engines that have a verified 100khrs on them, however my bet is they have gone through countless rebuilds over the years and are very well maintained along the way.

the reality for most of these engine's is going to be far less than 20k hrs because folks get lured into a false sense of security, forget to check the engine, service it regularly, forget antifreeze and let it freeze, such up dirt or bird feathers or something that drastically shortens the engines expected lifespan.

this would go for any engine though in my opinion, no matter how well it is designed, built and what it is made out of... we all know crap happens and then there is a pile of scrap iron to replace.

personally i prefer the chanfa's,  and really don't care much for the listeroids at all... but that is just me.
while i might take a genuine lister, i would probably never use it as it was intended, choosing rather to restore it to look at and listen to from time to time...

if i had to choose a lister type engine, to work long hours, it would have to be the gm90 if only because it has a real oil pump and oil to the big end brg... i really can't get excited about splash/dribble lubrication on an engine i have to depend on.

fwiw... which admittedly ain't much

bob g

[Tom Reed]

I've got 1 of each a Ashwamegh 6/1 and a Chang Chi NM195. Choosing which one is kind of  like choosing a wife. Some are tall slender and pretty and make nice cooing sounds, but  are high maintenance, while others are short squat and make ugly sounds, but are happy just to get a little attention once in a while. I run the 'roid because I like the sound. From my back porch it sounds like a steam locomotive pulling a big load up a grade. The flickering lights give the place a rustic quaintness too. 

[Henry W]

If I had a choice of a Listeroid or Chinese diesel I would have to pick the Chinese water cooled diesels. The S195 is a workhorse and they can be modified to have full flow filter system on them. As I said, I miss the one I sold.

[BruceM]

The appeal of the Listeroid for off grid homesteads is that 650 rpm.  It's a very pleasant sound.

Otherwise I'd rather have the higher quality of a somewhat slowed down Kubota or Perkins/CAT diesel.

[Ronmar]

I know the 6/1 is way more pleasant to stand next to than the changchi 1115:)  My 6/1 had a lot of gear train noise untill I installed an offset idler bolt.  That cleared up the lions share of the noise... The most noteable sound now is the whump of the exhaust.

[Honda lee]

Tell me more about the off set idler . I have a 98 model 195 I recently purchased and it is very noisie but so far runs great,but is hard to start on strait veggie and I have not been able to find a parts source. I am thinking about building a box made of walkin cooler panels to install it into for noise reduction.
As for the listeroid I have the dec 8/1 and the ashwamegh 25/2 . These are all to run my off grid homestead that I am working on. The 25/2 is still in the creat so I can't speak about it yet although I have high hopes for it,but I have been running the 8/1 for about a year now. It has no hr meter on it but has ran summer and winter about 30 hr a week. So far it starts first try every try and runs like a clock. It could move a little less but I think that is due to installing it on 3" steel rails and not straight to the concrete block. The power it produces is good but not enough to start my compressor but I think that is due to the st being wired for 220 and not all detacated to 110. All in all I think the 8/1 is perfect for the job of charging batteries, low rpms low fuel consumption low noise and so far very reliable. The 195 so far is much better at running loads but very noise stock, no parts other than what came with it and dose not want to start on veggie and  I can't seem to start it by hand thank goodness it has a starter. Hopefully the 25/2 will be as good as the 8/1 but generate enough power to meet all my needs, staytone for how it goes .

[Tom Reed]

The offset idler bolt is used to take up slack the gear train due to incorrect location of the bolt holes. I used one in my engine with a replacement bronze gear and there was a great reduction in valve train noise. You can see how much you have by removing the injector and cranking the engine by hand. If you hear a lot of clanking as lifters move past the tops of the lobes your gear train is sloppy.

Now that I have a lathe I may make a run of them if enough people are interested.

[Ronmar]

The offset idler bolt is used in the listeroid engines. It changes the rotational center point of the idler gear significantly reducing backlash in the gear drive.

Looking at my 1115, there does not appear to be as easy a fix to tighten up geartrain slop in the chinese horizontals:(.

[mobile_bob]

at one point in the past i was in contact with a chinese manufacture/supplier of helical cut gears that were designed for the 195, they of course were made to clear up the gear train noise associated with the standard spur cut gears typical of most all of the chinese horizontals

i didn't proceed with an order because the contact guys english was so poor it was near impossible to determine what problems they still had to work out, from what i recall there was a thrust issue (which is to be expected) but he was no clear what the fix or work around was for that... the case might need to be flycut for a thrust washer or something, i don't know and was not willing to purchase 3 sets of gears for 150 bucks plus shipping without knowing if these gears had actually been in use by someone that i could talk to.

it has been about 3 years, and i think i still have his contact info, maybe by now he can tell me what i need to know?  when i get some time i will check back in with him.

alternatively i really think much of the gear clatter could be abated by simply drilling a return passage to readmit the filtered bypass oil back into the gear train so that the gear teeth are bathed in oil which in turn would do much to dampen and quiet their whining/clattering noise.

anyone familiar with the straight cut back gears in an engine lathe should know just how little oil squirted into the running gears dramatically quiets their operation... and there is no reason why the same principle would not work for the engine gears.

fwiw, it is my belief that 90% of the gear noise is the counter balance shaft gears, based on the fact that the 175 and smaller engine's do not have these gears and there gear train noise is almost non existent.

bob g

[glort]

Very informative replies. Thank you all.
It's very good to get info from the users mouths as it were than rely on parroted internet fable by people that often have no experience but an opinion anyway.

I'm seriously thinking of letting the "roid go in favour for a real Lister or maybe a bigger china Horizontal.
It seems the opinions I had formed with the roid in my short time with it were not unfounded which is good to know.

What do people think are the quietest engines or more over, the easiest engines to make quiet?
I'm wondering about the Merc 617 Engine I pulled from my old car before it rusted away.  Being 80 HP or so I should be able to run it pretty slow and quiet and still get good power out of the thing. Should be smooth as well although consumption would be interesting.
Not all that worried, It lived on a veg diet for years before so could easily do so again.

Anyone re purposed Vehicle engines before?

[M61hops]

Hi Glort.  I think a properly tweaked 6-1 Listeroid might be the least noisy diesel you can get.  Maybe a small 3 cylinder Kubota would be a good one also.  It seems that even though you go to a lot of work to hide as much noise as possible you can somehow sense that a diesel is nearby (maybe the vibrations are felt?  )  My 2 cents, and I've tried!  If I ever get the time I'll try and convert a Changfa 175A to spark ignition and see how quiet I can get it.  I also hope to try an old Ford Fiesta motor running on propane for a CHP project.  For me quiet is the most important quality and #2 is low fuel cost.                         Leland

[glort]

Vibration indeed seems a problem.
Thats one reason I was wondering about the merc engine. I could enclose that for noise and even thought it's a 5 Cylinder, It ran pretty smooth in the vehicle.
I'd never have to worry about not enough power with the thing and could drive multiple alternators or a pump/ compressor all at once probably.
I asked about Governors as I couldn't find anything and it seems that this may be an issue in getting something cost effective and suitable.

[SteveU.]

Good Moring glort
If you decide to use your Mercedes Benz 5 cylinder engine be sure and keep intact the engine mounts and positions exactly a they were in the vehicle. The 5 cylinders were tryed by Henery Ford to be an option step up from his beloves 4 cyclinders but the changing weird engine viberation and occilations symied him. He himself refused to used the hated Chevtolet inline 6 configutration - why he skipped up to V-8 as a mrketing edge.
Many of the V-6's also have strnge charicteristics hidden by expensive hydroelestic engine mounts, mount locations and added on rubber mounted eternal weights  - dum-dums.
Sure to be the same techiquies MB, Volvo used to operator apparent tame these 5 cylinders.
Remove it and hard/simple mount it will be an awakening Henry expereince.

Regards
Steve Unruh