Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

Yeah I have several boats with outboards and 2 with Mercruiser I/Os and prefer the I/Os by a wide margin. Longevity alone is their strongest point over outboards.

I'll stick with I/Os until I'm too old and decrepit to climb around in the bilge

Yeah that under the motor fuel filter is a bitch and Mercruiser does it too. Until the 3.0 went fuel injection 2 years ago that is.

Although I have another thread running elsewhere (new guy questions) this thread seemed more appropriate....
A toon we are looking at has the Merc Verado 150 on board, I noticed its supercharged, what are everyones' thoughts on it?
Anybody have one?

When I was looking for Waverunners a lot of folks told me to stay away from Superchargers as they don't yield THAT much more top end (just torque) and that is one more thing to maintain.

The Verados are great, but their benefits are somewhat overkill on an inland lake for a recreational boater. The price of the motor is not bad, but additions are a bitc_. They're great for an offshore fisherman running dual engines, however.

The fly by wire controls are very expensive ($1.1K) vs the old cable throttle/gear selector. The gauges are very, very expensive if you go with all the flow meters, miles to empty, etc.--easy to put over $2K just in gauges.

The biggest pontoon boat dealer in the U.S. charges $3K-$4K to hook up a Verado--depending on options chosen. They charge $899 to rig an old generation cable control engine (like a 115 hp).

Verados are not the best motor to repower a boat hull with, as most dealers cringe at having to rewire a boat not built with Verado wiring harnesses. Dealers prefer the boat manufacturers prewire the boat as they're built.

One benefit is that they can use the Mercury power steering unit on Mercury hydraulic steering, which is 1/2 the cost of Teleflex's SeaStar power steering unit.

The engines have a lot of torque, but they're supposedly very tough on fuel at higher rpm's. And if your supercharger goes out, a new one is $3K.

I personally don't want to spend $5K-$6K for rigging and gauges I don't need. We live in the middle of a 16 mile long lake, and the max distance we'll ever be from home is 10 miles. We try to keep our boats as simple as possible.

Mercury's new 150 hp Fourstroke is just what the doctor ordered. Big cubic inches, no supercharger, cable controls--just somewhat simple in comparison with the Verados. You can purchase a 150 Fourstroke and have it rigged for $11K--cheaper than Yamaha, Suzuki or ETEC. They're going to do very, very well with this new motor.

People that look at this forum will notice some complaints about Mercury's customer service, purchasing and rebadging Tohatsu motors, and outsourcing other motors to the Far East. Mercury is not as customer oriented as they once were. Neither is Yamaha--under new management.

Gotcha. The boat we were looking at is an 07 Crest with 150 hrs, so the motor is already installed and everything. BUT i hear ya on the supercharger, I had that 'gut' feeling I should stay away from them, but wanted to make sure from people who know.
Thanks for the advice!

The wife and I found a toon we really like, it has a 150hp Suzuki O/B on it...how are those motors? Any thoughts/reviews?

Im never been a a merc fan , I grew up with the 80 some gen Mercs that I ironically have on my toon now that got me afraid of them . Ive had good luck with johnsons and yamahas , note I have no first hand experience with any out boards post 2000 so now Im way out of the loop.

Yamaha all the way ill never buy another inboard after all the problems with the last mercruiser junk

Seems like the outboard fourstrokes are the way to go now (Yamaha, Honda, Suzuki - not necessarily in that order).

Last CC boat we sold had 1150+ hrs on a pair of 250 yams - no issues.

Buddy of mine works for the CG - 8k+ hrs on their previous set of Honda on their RHIB over 3500 on the new set.

Crabber friend on my inlaws on the coast runs his zuke's to 5k before selling - on that he sold local reports to have 9k on it.

hope this helps.

I really believe its the service that counts these days. If the dealer you use is a reputable guy you will like that motor. Someone said Suzuki, I wont have another one but it was not so much the motor but the dealership and their underhanded methods. I have had Everything but a Honda and I have a New 135 Honda waiting at the shop for my rebuild to show up. Now take all that and $2.00 and go buy coffee.

Are Hondas better? They sure cost more, not sure if that equates to better. Ask Me this winter!

My experience is with Suzuki's only at a technical level but I have run Evinrude and Yamaha. I have had a 2004 Suzuki DF50 on my 18' pontoon for the past 4 years (since I got the boat) and just recently upgraded to a 1998 DF70 (fixer upper) for the extra 20HP. I am still amazed how much quieter the DF70 is than the DF50...

All I have to say is my new 2014 Merc 60 Bigfoot had to be towed in by a 40 year old Johnson 50 smokepot. Seems the boat was delivered to me with a blown 25amp fuse and the battery died after about 5 hours of running.

Take this info for what its worth, I have never owned an outboard before, but I just ordered the new Suzuki 250A fly by wire for 3 reasons A Cost was much less than the others B It came with a 6 year warranty and C most importantly my good friend is a dealer for Mercury and Suzuki and he recommended the Suzuki and has Sold 200 Suzuki's this year compared to 20 Mercs. He is a racer and a die hard true blue Merc Guy but says the Suzuki is a better all around motor when your looking at other things besides performance such as durability, warranty and fuel efficiency. That being said, he is running around with a pair of Verados on his boat