On Wed, 28 Nov 07, HK wrote:
Do you think
they'd be less problematical if their manufacturers concentrated on
improving the quality of the parts they contain and worried less about
new and sometimes dubious features?

I've owned both OMC and Mercruiser sterndrives and I think parts
quality is fine in both. And I think the general idea of sterndrive is
good. But whoever came up with the original design just wasn't
thinking. For instance, why pump water up through the outdrive and
through the transom? An inboard pumps it up through the bottom, a
sterndrive could do the same. There's a couple of other design problem
too but basically they made the whole thing to complex when it didn't
really have to be.

Rick