Why did my motor lock up ???????????

[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

Hey sporster, ever had an oil pump fail on a 2007-2009 75-115 hp 4 stroke "verado"? Such a crappy design! I've got two before they scattered themselves. And you sure don't want to see the price on an e-tec longblock!

Yep, we call the Mercs "welfare motors" and when a customer asks us which new outboards are the best we just tell them they're all junk!

 

[- BiRkS_]

You know what, IMO a merc will take the most abuse, and still be the easiest to work on! Buy an E-tec for the wholeshot and 5 year dealer warranty. But when they break, its thousands, and a pain to work on. Buy a merc for ease of maintenace and reliability. (even when they break, you can often limp home). Buy a yamaha if you want heavy, gutless and electronic failiure boat anchor!

In a rental boat environment, we've killed almost 8 yamaha's, 2 johnsons, 1 e-tec, and 1 2005 merc 75 that went through a sandbar, overheated, and melted #1 piston. 2 of our verados failed oil pumps, but I managed to save them. 60 bigfoots needed headgaskets after many overheats and 1 failed fuel float. One of them was at 3600 hours! burns a little oil, but it sure doesn't owe us a dime!

But then again, these outboard engines normally operate between 4000-5500 rpm. Not a rotax running 7200 rpm and bouncing off the rev limiter, being run hard from cold, not being able to cool off, etc. Just the cost of having fun. If you want bulletproof, get a 587. You really have to be an idiot to kill one of those. The 951 is a ticking time bomb, just as long as you treat it like a princess and take care of her needs, she'll put out lots. But cheap out on her, and she'll drain your pocket book quick, and take half the motor when she blows!

 

[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

You know what, IMO a merc will take the most abuse, and still be the easiest to work on! Buy an E-tec for the wholeshot and 5 year dealer warranty. But when they break, its thousands, and a pain to work on. Buy a merc for ease of maintenace and reliability. (even when they break, you can often limp home). Buy a yamaha if you want heavy, gutless and electronic failiure boat anchor!

In a rental boat environment, we've killed almost 8 yamaha's, 2 johnsons, 1 e-tec, and 1 2005 merc 75 that went through a sandbar, overheated, and melted #1 piston. 2 of our verados failed oil pumps, but I managed to save them. 60 bigfoots needed headgaskets after many overheats and 1 failed fuel float. One of them was at 3600 hours! burns a little oil, but it sure doesn't owe us a dime!

But then again, these outboard engines normally operate between 4000-5500 rpm. Not a rotax running 7200 rpm and bouncing off the rev limiter, being run hard from cold, not being able to cool off, etc. Just the cost of having fun. If you want bulletproof, get a 587. You really have to be an idiot to kill one of those. The 951 is a ticking time bomb, just as long as you treat it like a princess and take care of her needs, she'll put out lots. But cheap out on her, and she'll drain your pocket book quick, and take half the motor when she blows!

We move a lot of Yamahaha's. They rule this lake now, and we don't have much problem with them and I think they're a breeze to work on. We also sell an occasional e-tec as well, they sure run sweet and sound really strong out of water. Plenty of blown up mercs, 2 stroke EFI's always getting wiped out, crankcase full of piston pieces. Every spring seems like somebody always looses an old 2 stroke to a plugged carb, sad. My favorite outboard ever is the old carbed johnson v6. I like the old Force 4 cylinder outboards as well, they run good and easy to work on, reliable. If it's not a pontoon with outboard, then merc sterndrives, tons of them running around here in ski boats.