I'm shopping around for a used boat and I was wondering; how many hours
is too many on a two stroke outboard? Most of the boats I'm looking at
have dual Yamaha 250DPIs. I've seen them with 400 hours and I've seen
them with over 1000. I know this answer will vary depending on how well
the engines were maintained but I suspect there is some rule of thumb
that I just do not know.

Thanks
--
Rob

I have a 99 225 ficht, it has about 800 hours on it now and it is still in
mint condition. Runs like a dream and I think I have gone through about 5 or
6 sets of sparkplugs.






"Rob" wrote in message
. ..
I'm shopping around for a used boat and I was wondering; how many hours
is too many on a two stroke outboard? Most of the boats I'm looking at
have dual Yamaha 250DPIs. I've seen them with 400 hours and I've seen
them with over 1000. I know this answer will vary depending on how well
the engines were maintained but I suspect there is some rule of thumb
that I just do not know.

Thanks
--
Rob

At a certain point you are really asking how much is new. I put 2500-3000 hours
on my old 75 Mariner but by then it had lots of new parts. The powerhead and
foot internals were still original but I had replaced/rebuilt a lot of other
stuff. It still had good compression and ran OK so a guy paid me $500 for it
but it was certainly tired.

On Fri, 23 Jan 2004 00:45:37 GMT, Rob wrote:
I'm shopping around for a used boat and I was wondering; how many hours
is too many on a two stroke outboard? Most of the boats I'm looking at
have dual Yamaha 250DPIs. I've seen them with 400 hours and I've seen
them with over 1000. I know this answer will vary depending on how well
the engines were maintained but I suspect there is some rule of thumb
that I just do not know.
================================================== ====

1500 to 2000 hours is about tops for any gasoline engine and many fail
earlier. There are always exceptions of course.

On Fri, 23 Jan 2004 00:45:37 GMT, Rob wrote:

I'm shopping around for a used boat and I was wondering; how many hours
is too many on a two stroke outboard? Most of the boats I'm looking at
have dual Yamaha 250DPIs. I've seen them with 400 hours and I've seen
them with over 1000. I know this answer will vary depending on how well
the engines were maintained but I suspect there is some rule of thumb
that I just do not know.

The way I would evaluate a high hours outboard is to check compression
across all the cylinders and make sure it is acceptable for the hp and
age (anything within 10/15% of the new rating is good), check the
general condition of the engine (does it look like it was maintained
properly), run it (make sure it doesn't smoke a lot and runs
smoothly), make sure it shifts in/out of gear, etc. Offer the seller
half what the asking price is and go up from there.

Then, cross your fingers and hope for the best. ;)

A couple of years ago, I bought a '73 Boston Whaler Sport with an '83
Johnson 70 and a spare '83 70 Evinrude power head. Over the winter I
converted the Whaler to a CC and gave some thought to changing the
original powerhead over to the Evinrude - the Johnson looked tired,
ran a little rough, had low compression in one cylinder, etc. Spring
came and just for giggles I took it out to Webster Lake and ran it -
for about the first fifteen minutes I thought I would need the
trolling motor to get it back to the launch ramp - cough, spit, hack,
wheeze - it was running horrible. Then it started getting a little
better, a little better and finally, it was making hole shots and
pushing that 16 foot Whaler along at 45 mph at 3/4 throttle. I sold
it and it's still running strong today.

The moral is, you never know with a used, high hours (or old)
outboard.

Good luck.

Later,

Tom
S. Woodstock, CT
----------
"The wildness and adventure that are in
fishing still recommend it to me."

Henry David Thoreau
"Walden" (1854)