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I did a Yanmar replacement myself. I bought the engine with upgraded panel and an 80 amp alternator for $9500 in 2007 delivered. I spent another $800 or so on getting some machining done to fit it in (shaft facing, metal shims, new through hulls, new sound proofing, hoses) And I replaced the water heater, the exhaust hose (you will likely need to do this with whatever you repower it with), the shaft (I would recommend this) and the stuffing box (this is your big chance to redo all this stuff while you have the engine out). I think I spent, all told, $15K for engine, shaft, water heater, hoses, over $100 in hose clamps alone, materials to rebed, and generally redoing all the things back there. When I shopped actual prices in 2007, the cost of a Yanmar vs. the Beta was about the same. You want to get a quote from the local Yanmar dealer who has the highest volume in your area, as Yanmar lowers the wholesale price to high volume folks and mine passed this along to me. Westerbeke was a bit more and I had had enough of their part prices and they are tractor engines as well.
I went with Yanmar because its marinization is engineered into the design of the engine, not cobbled together out of repurposed tractor engine. Things like heat exchangers (which were a problem to maintain with the Westerbeke) are integral and made from metals that can stand up to salt without a lot of zincs to stave off the corrosion issues that plague engine systems not designed for this. Parts are available here and internationally (I spent a couple years cruising in Central America and you can get parts for Yanmars just about anywhere and mechanics know them because they are standard in yachts) and, at least from my local dealer, buying routine filters (eg. oil filters about $7), impellers and fan belts, is less expensive than buying at the auto parts store. I had great support from my local dealer during my installation, but that may vary by your location. I have about 500 hours on my engine and could not be happier with it. There is a log of my replacement in the technical section of the T37 website. Yanmar has an engine installation book that would be good for any self installer to use and I recommend it. Actually, it would be good for some of the yards to read it. The district rep for Yanmar said that the DIY installations were generally better than many of the yard jobs because yard guys do it the way they learned it years ago, and do not read the current literature.
Having said that, you will see that a lot of folks like Beta and I am all for competition. With diligent maintenance of the external systems of heat exchangers and marinized exhausts (new engines generally recommend larger exhaust hoses because of research on the effects of back pressure) One of the challenges is that the old Westerbeke 50 had a crankshaft exit that was 1.5X" below the level of the engine mounts---a very odd configuration, since most exit at the level of the engine mounts. It means that you must either modify the engine bed (cut it down a couple inches), or get some very fancy engine mounts. I understand that Beta says they will manufacture these for you. I am not sure how they do that, as the bed is very narrow and it would be tricky, but some have apparently done it successfully. I cut my bed down and it really was not that big a deal if you have some idea of working with fiberglass. You probably want to get in there and paint and fix everything anyway while the engine is out, and cutting down the bed means the next guy won't have issues. I think cutting the bed down took a few extra hours of my time and I am glad I didi it. I dropped the bed about 2.5" and made some metal shims to get the positioning perfect.
OK. Having said that---I think a lot of yacht repowering is done unnecessarily. Diesels last a long time and folks get impatient with them. I had broken a ring on my engine which had 4500 hours on it. This came after I left it for a couple rainy seasons in the tropical jungles of Panama. It was running fine up til then. Although Westerbeke parts are breathtakingly expensive and some of the the W50 parts are getting hard to find, I think a lot of people rush into replacement. I probably could have replaced the rings and gotten more out of it. I met a lot of full time cruisers with 6 to 10 K hours on their engines, but these were run hard and long and maintained better than a lot of our marina queens. But if yours starts after a couple revolutions and is not burning enormous quantities of oil, you might consider coaxing it along. Well maintained diesels with clean fuel and maintained cooling systems do not often suddenly fail. Mine ran for 500 hours after it broke a ring.
BTW--read and observe the break in procedures. They probably are not what you think. Also you might consider a new prop as the prop pitch should be matched to the torque of your engine. You can solve this by getting a feathering, externally adjustable prop and get it all perfect. A poorly matched prop will drastically shorten the life of your new engine. Yanmar will not warrant an engine with poorly matched prop--and I would not either. IMHO, many of the production boats have horribly overpitched propellers. While this may make you think your engine is very quiet, lugging a diesel is an express ticket to your next replacement or overhaul.
I would say I spent a bit more than 100 hours on replacing everything. Quite a bit of off line thinking and getting stuff together. But it is very satisfying and informative to do all the work yourself. You can take the time to do things right.
Ray
Velera
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