Notoriously Unreliable Outboards!

My 99 johnson outboard 2 stroke 4 cylinder is incredibly reliable. I bought it in 2010 and it hadn't been ran in about 6 years at the time. It started up immediately but needed carbs rebuilt because of sitting all those years with fuel in it. But since then, its been basically perfect. In the last 14 years ive only had to change change lower unit oil seals once and a spark plug wire once. Never even needed the spark plugs changed though I did change them once last year but only because it seemed crazy they never needed it. It ran the same. 25 years and its still perfect

I can comment on the Etecs having had dozens of them and running them commercially. They were extremely reliable and long lived. Sure they ate the occasional injector or EMM but we’re talking about several years and thousands of hours between failures. I ran them for 4 or 5 years before replacing with new engines. We put around 7,500 hours on an outboard in 5 years. As for dealer nightmares I never had any. My dealer always had them fixed in a day or two at most. Granted taking an engine or boat to the dealer was a pain in the ass so I eventually bought the BRP diagnostic software, and it was pretty cheap. With a cheap laptop and the software replacing an injector was a very quick and easy job. EMM failures were almost always the charging system. The secret to long life with these things is to run the XD 100 oil on the XD 50 setting. BRP tells you to do this if your using it commercially. When I sold these engines they still ran like a raped ape even with 7500 hours. Calendar time was the killer of them after 5 years they started to have small electrical issues such as bad sensors and other minor issues. As a commercial operation even an hour or two of downtime to get and replace a sensor was unacceptable so I never ran one past 5 years. I have no idea how long they were good for but compared to the other outboards I’ve tried these things were exponentially more reliable. In my experience most of the other 2 stokes wouldn’t last more then about 1 or 2 years or about 2500 hours without a powerhead failure. When we had to go to 4 strokes we spent an incredible amount of time doing maintenance. Only maintenance on an etec was a set of spark plugs a couple times a year. The 4 stroke Suzukis and Yamahas require oil changes every couple weeks, timing belt jobs, ect. With a fleet of a dozen or more boats running 12 or more hours a day 7 days a week just keeping up with maintenance is a major pain in the ass and can only be done at night when the boats are not in service. Seems like every damn night your not going home after working 12 or more hours but doing maintenance. I absolutely loved the Etecs from a commercial operators point of view. They just didn’t need any maintenance and just made us money. I can absolutely understand how the maintenance of a 4 stroke isn’t an issue for a recreational boat or even a commercial singe boat operation. Not a big deal to change the oil on one or two engines once every couple weeks.

I've had them all over the decades and Tohatsu 4-stroke has been my most reliable, trouble free outboard -- considerably less expensive, too.

Dude I love born again boating. This is a good question. I am a nut. I have been taking a 16ft 1967 starcraft over 40 miles offshore of NJ. I've ran Honda Merc 2 stroke and now a 4 stroke. My motor now is a 2020 40hp Merc. I love this motor. I never have any worry that is going to fail. Now my dad swore by the old OMC SeaDrive. We had one on a v20 steplift and a pair on a 250 sportsman. We never really had any out of the ordinary issues and he had the pair from 88 till 01. And they were still working when he got rid of the boat

You nailed it with the abuse and neglect. With the Ficht it was both of these and ignorance. I have a 2004 225 Ficht with over 130 psi on all cylinders, perfectly maintained by me. Always run ethanol free fuel, XD50 oil, new plugs “ indexed “ every year. To date has over 1000 hours. Proper maintenance is the Number 1 key.

The 2 strokes with carburetors especially after sitting for a while the gas component in the mixture would evaporate from the fuel bowls and the oil component would not evaporate and when starting you get a very high oil to gas ratio and hence the big cloud of smoke. I had 1995 Johnson ocean runners and wow those things could outdo a James Bond smoke screen.

Interesting topic for certain. My 2006 Etec 40HP has run without fault. Always used high test gas XD50 oil and their gas additive. Can troll 8 hrs in a day without a hiccup with a 1/2 to 3/4 hr run out and again back in. Now 2023 and start of a new season without even taking a screwdriver out. My kicker is a 76 4 HP rude and has a carb rebuild and parts still easy to find.

Unbelievable amazing discussion! Kudos to you guys and everyone who helped make this happen. You can’t describe a whole pie by one slice. Consumers have preconceived notions and individual frames of reference when it comes to descriptions and opinions. I have come to adopt a mantra in all things…..know what something is and what it isn’t. Advertising is meant to sell a product under the guise of educating the consumer! Again….great job and wonderful depth of knowledge. Very impressed.

Good talk. He's absolutely correct about no mech working on Etecs. I can't find a service shop that works on etecs within 2 hours of where I live.

My grandpa baught new in 87’ a Yamaha pro v 150j passed down to my uncle and passed down to me 15 yrs ago, the motor has been flawless until last year had to finally change the power pack! $300 on eBay I changed it myself . Runs like new !

Just a suggestion, some commentary on how you guys started, were you around boats as a kid, worst job, best job, etc. Would be interesting especially considering how young you all seem.

F150 Yamaha had soft balancers shredding and clogging oil passages and and popping engines.

i used to have a 2002 20 hp 2 stroke merc that we bought new, we had it for like 17 years and onkly did a impeller and plugs once , never let me stranded.... had a 2005 200hp ox66 nothing but reliability, currently have a 2006 50hp 2 stroke yamaha and a 2018 90 yamaha

I run a 2003 Johnson 115 on my classic Boston Whaler. I bought it new and have run it with very few issues. I disabled the VRO oil injection a few years ago and the motor just runs great. I don't run anything but recreational fuel and it's a beast of a motor.

Proud owner of a 94 Mercury Xri 175. The motor is just too easy to rebuild myself. The boat racing community loves the Mercury 2.5l v6 for a good reason.

My mechanic here in Australia won't touch any Evinrude. I use a Yamaha 130 V4 2 stroke. 130psi on all four cylinders and has been reliable. It has never failed to get me home and damn does it pull hard. My only gripe are warm restarts with heatsoak. That's 2 strokes for you though - having to re-prime the engine.

I was able to purchase the Evenrude factory Ficht etec software for under $100. My pair of ficht 225 are still running strong pushing a scarab 302 with excellent speed and mpg. I run em like i stole em and on borrowed time lol.

150 johnson 2 stroke . I put gas in it turn key and it flies ..winter pull. Runi out gas while its flushing w/ fresh water .fog it . See you next season 22 years now ..very reliable , fast too

I’ve got a 2005 Yamaha TLR 115 2 stroke on my first boat. Glad to hear y’all say some good things about it.

I had a boat with twin 90 Fichts on it, ran it for 2 years 0 issues, i currently have a 300hp G2, im only 8 months and 30 hours into my ownership of it so far, its had one issue with the magnets coming off the flywheel, stuck em back on with some JB weld seems to be going ok since. compared to a 250 honda 4 stroke it runs like a madman The reason for the serial numbers on the injectors, is they all flow slightly differently at different RPMS, this is checked in the factory and you need to give this data to the ECU when fitting to ensure correct fuel quantity's are injected. The software for a G1 can be brought for about $50 i think. for the G2 its more expensive. Contrary to what these guys say, you can see on a modern outboard what sort of abuse it has taken. You can get the service records for it to check its been looked after, and you can get a print out from the ECU which will tell you things like time at all the RPMS, max RPM recorded, records of over heats or issues, etc. This will give you a pretty good idea of the way its been run