Which brand?

S

SPrice

New member
Hello C-Brats,
Im looking at a 25' cruiser and thinking of re-powering with twin 90's.
When I travel to the Carribean, Bahamas, Central America, Mexico etc, all I see are Yamaha's. I was in Costa Rica last month and talked to fishermen and they were very satisfied with Yamaha's. Obviously the service network is geared toward Yamaha's.

I probably will not be motoring the 25' C-Dory cruiser to these destinations but I will stay in the Pacific Northwest and SE Alaska.

My needs are to have a fuel efficient motor, less costly maintenance and repairs and part availabilty.

2 stroke or 4 stroke?

I appreciate any and all input.

Happy New Year.

Scott
 
In Barrow Alaska the motors receive very harsh treatment. They almost all use Yamaha I,m told
That is what I would choose.
Chris
 
Yamaha's are the weapon of choice all along the E. coast of Vancouver Island, where we typically cruise. When asked, the owners cite a network of dealers and repair facilities as the reason. Makes sense to me.
 
Dreamer":3ruz9bqr said:
Yamaha's are the weapon of choice all along the E. coast of Vancouver Island, where we typically cruise. When asked, the owners cite a network of dealers and repair facilities as the reason. Makes sense to me.
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Exactly so, and the evidence is the same on up into SE Alaska. I know from almost 40 years experience that the Petersburg small boat harbor has gone from a large majority of Hondas in the 70's to an even larger majority of Yamahas today. Several things may have contributed to this change, not all of them related to any qualitative differences in the brands.

Talk to Les and other experts. From a reliability and performance perspective, you probably cannot go wrong with one of today's outboards. Availability of parts and service should be one consideration (it definitely was in my case), but I wouldn't let it outweigh everything else. For instance, when I was deciding on which brand to buy, engine weight and alternator output were at least as important as dealership location and reputation. At the time I was deciding, all three of those things pointed in the same direction.

Decide what's important for your intended use, do your research and make a decision. Then don't look back, and enjoy the heck out of your boat.

Good luck!
 
Much as I love my Hondas, I can testify first hand to the problems associated with getting any work done on them as a transient once you are North of that dotted line on the water. Apart from the issues involved in getting Honda US and Honda Eh! to agree on warranty issues there are not that many dealerships and one of those is high on my list of scoundrels. :thdown

M
 
I had a 1000 hours plus on my honda 90 carb when i sold the boat and I expect to get even more from my honda 225. That said I would not get a honda FI 90 honda. I would go with the yamaha. I have been told from three different sources that work with or for guide lodges and guide boats that the honda Fi 90s are not lasting much more then 700 to 900 hours. Now given thats a lot of hours and its a great running motor. Also guides really work and abuse their motors, but the problems all seem to be the same and are occurring around the same hour time on the motors. Now thats just second hand word on the water but when every guide my three friends know have changed to yamaha in the last two years then that says something to me. The carb 90 was the go to motor for these guys but the Fi 90 is not holding up. just my 2cents
 
I would look at Suzuki for weight savings as far as four strokes. The Evinrude E-Tec 2 strokes have been great motors, and agian, light weight. The Yamaha 90 will have bigger alternator output than the Suzuki, may not be quite as much as the Evinrude.

Agree that who your local dealer is should be part of the equation- Not just anybody can work on today's engines, and you want a working relationship with your local dealer.
 
starcrafttom":1qvz83e0 said:
I had a 1000 hours plus on my honda 90 carb when i sold the boat and I expect to get even more from my honda 225. That said I would not get a honda FI 90 honda. I would go with the yamaha. I have been told from three different sources that work with or for guide lodges and guide boats that the honda Fi 90s are not lasting much more then 700 to 900 hours. Now given thats a lot of hours and its a great running motor. Also guides really work and abuse their motors, but the problems all seem to be the same and are occurring around the same hour time on the motors. Now thats just second hand word on the water but when every guide my three friends know have changed to yamaha in the last two years then that says something to me. The carb 90 was the go to motor for these guys but the Fi 90 is not holding up. just my 2cents
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"honda Fi 90s are not lasting much more then 700 to 900 hours."

THAT'S $10 PER HOUR JUST FOR THE MOTOR COST OVER THE LIFE OF THE ENGINE.

Assuming you can get 2000 or so hours out of another brand, you could cut it down to $5 PER HOUR INSTEAD!

NO BRAINER #1 FOR TUESDAY, JANUARY 3, 2012!!! :lol:

Joe. :teeth :thup
 
I got the same information about the Honda 90 FI motor as starcrafttom.

A water taxi operator in the Broughton Island area of BC reported that the motors are failing at about 750 hours.

The part that fails is the cam drive chain which then destroys the powerhead.

Reportedly, the commercial operators in that area are sticking with the carb Honda 90 or going to Yamaha.
 
Larry, had this water taxi operator personally experienced a failure or had he just heard of them?

Is the "cam drive chain" something that is supposed to be replaced or serviced periodically? I just looked in my owners manual, and found no mention of such a part.
 
20Dauntless,

The person who spoke to me did not personally have a failure, but he reported that other commercial operators in his area, that he knows, have had failures. My source still runs the carbureted Honda 90's on his boats.

As I understand it, the new Honda 90FI is based on the Honda Fit engine, which has a chain driven cam. It is this cam drive that fails. My quess is that its because a horizontal engine was turned upright to create the outboard.

I am not a Honda expert, but I would like to hear more about exactly which parts are the problem.

Image from Honda Parts catalog.




Honda_Fit_Cam.jpg
 
Thanks for the additional info. As a an owner of a Honda 90 with EFI, I'd also like to know what specifically goes wrong.

FWIW, I have spoken with several Honda dealers about this supposed issue and none of them said they had ever heard or dealt with the issue. Granted, they have a stake in ensuring a positive reputation for Honda outboards, but they have known that I already own a BF90D and indicated these have been reliable and trouble free.

I've also tried to track down internet reports of the issue to no avail. This engine has now been available for more than four years, and if there was really a widespread problem with them self destructing around 700-900 hours, there'd be angry owners posting or complaining about it online.
 
I have a 60hp Yamaha on my Alumaweld and a Honda 150 on the Cape Cruiser. The Yamaha is far and away my favorite motor.
 
I bought my boat used, (barely 80 hours) from a guy in northern California who was setting it up to retire and fish his way to Alaska, and back, many times. It was his 34th boat, and he had been up the inside passage several times. He put TWIN YAMAHA's on it, for duplicate redundancy and durable dependency :wink: (Oh no, There he goes again :oops:

I think he knew what was doing he was doing :smiled and I have had no problems since I got over the :smiled initial stale fuel from a long sit in the sunshine.

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

IMGP1255.highlight.jpg
 
My boat has twin 50 hp Suzuki's that are absolutely terrific. Problem is that the only Suzuki shop is 500 miles away. Fortunately, I'm very good at fixing boat motors and care motors and airplane motors, so I'm comfortable with the Suzy's. However, if I was re-powering I'd be hard pressed not to buy a pair of e-tech's. I have so many friends with good experience with these very simple motors. The weight savings alone is very good and the 22's do get heavy in the back end with 4 strokes. The e-techs are two stroke, but terrific in terms of low polution. They are quieter than the 4's and smooth as silk.

I have a 25hp e-tech on my fishing boat and it snaps your head off out of the hole, even on a fairly heavily loaded boat.

I'd definitely re-power with e-tech. Parts count on those motor is way lower than the 4's.

Just something else to think about when you are talking many many grand in investment.
 
The truth is that if you Google Honda 90 FI Outboard Reliability, you will find nothing but but rave reviews. We have a Honda and Yamaha dealer near us and I have posed this question to them and I have also checked with two dealers of both motors in the Portland area. There is no factual evidence that I'm aware of to support the rumors posted. As I stated earlier in another post, I have seen the hour meters on boats in our area with 1000-3000 hours of reliable service on their Honda 90 FI with no premature failures.

I don't have a dog in this fight but would like to have the truth prevail. I know that Honda is a company based on leadership in producing quality durable products for many years. Do any of you really believe that Honda would continue to produce an outboard with documented premature failures for 6 model years, without addressing the issue!
 
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