If it is of any interest, I have a Speedliner 18 ft boat that several of my
local friends work with Karl on during the development of the I/O. Perhaps
one of the reasons that Karl had limited interest in the I/O initially was
because he and these guys were hard at developing their own version and when
Steve Winn upstaged them, it may have irritated him! As I turns out I was
friends with the boat designer/builder, the machinists here in Kansas City,
MO working with Karl and Karl, The boat designer/builder passed away just
a few years ago. Fortunately I got to work with him on several projects
including the final boat built by Speedliner, a "B" Racing Runabout for me.
We built it in 6 days! Of course it took another couple of weeks to get the
finish and hardware on. I have a Yamato engine on it and have only run it
once in my 3 acre farm pond. I treasure this boat because it represents the
end of an era and good times with the folks at Speedliner. We all used to
race together in the Midwest.

Don Dando



I'm guessing that the answer to the Volvo question is the Duo-Prop design
that Volvo came out with before Merk did.

As far as "no neutral on an outboard", I think OMC was tearing up gear cases
on their larger hp motors and Karl stated that Merk wasn't going to have
that problem. He used proven non shifting lower units and reversed the
direction of the power head, hence the "DR" Direct Reverse engine. I
collect and restore outboards and have about 25 DR's.


Don Dando


wrote in message
roups.com...
Billgran wrote:

: wrote in message
: oups.com...
:
: OK, let's try another.
:
: What part in Mercruiser outdrives required them to pay royalties to
: Volvo Penta?
:
: (Getting my ideas from a great book called "The Iron Fist".)
:
: b.

: It's been a long time since I read that book, but my recollection is
from
: earlier days with OMC. I believe the dual u-joint drive shaft was the
item
: that required the royalties. OMC stern-drives had to use the "ball-gear"
: setup to get around that patent. Back in the '30s, OMC had a stern drive
: setup used to power barges.

That's it!.

There was a guy (Steve Wynn?) who invented the sterndrive whilst working
for Karl and Karl didn't think it was a good idea. He left for Volvo
Penta
and that really irked Kiekiefer. OMC used the ball gear to get around it
until the patent expired on it. Then they went to the Cobra drive.

Additionally, Kiekiefer didn't think there was a "need" for a neutral in
an outboard. Hence, those throttles/shifts with the starter button on
the end of the handle.

Karl was quite a tyrant. Ironically, he had an *electrical* engineering
degree and designed outboard motors.

b.