Its seems mercury is really putting the screws to the dealers and the dealers are are passing it on.. i have heard that if you buy a new boat you will only be getting a mercury product in there and no after market power... i for one and im sure im not alone, i will never buy a new boat if thats the case.. mercury has had the arm on the industry in the past and it seems they are trying to keep it to themselves.. this time its plain extortion... the new boat market will really go to sh it worse than it is now.. if all these companies get together and they might get something accomplished, but it will never happen and we the consumer will get the short end of the stick, as usual..

hey skip braver, if you think you running short of dealers now, just wait a little while... i will never buy a new cigarette with garbage from mercury... its bad enough im stuck with mercury for drives. ill never have mercury powering my ride...

I think it's pretty much been that way with most builders for a while hasn't it?

two things come to mind from this thread:

A) I got a check in the mail from a class action lawsuit in 1997 for Mercruiser being fined as a monopoly. I would think they'd want to be more careful.

B) No use yelling at Skip Braver about this kind of stuff. He already pissed alot of the dealers off when he forced them to buy an alloted amount of Cigs or loose their dealership rights.

Cigarette is stronger right now then they have ever been...just read their press releases.

Maybe, just maybe, because CRT is now sponsoring this forum.....someone from their company will sign up here and comment on why all of the dealers are dropping them. Most by choice, but from what I have heard, at least one by their parents.

Guess who?
It's not monopolized....
Customers can send their own power for install. Though the financials may steer you back to merc power....

cuda your right, for the most part yes.. the're still a few that will put different power in the boats, and honer your warranty.... you know who, i dont need to bring up names, but if i want a different package ill get one.. im not going to let mercury tell me who i can put in for power... with that move, they will kill the new boat market...

On our first Cig. we went with Sterling 1050's. We had problems from day one with the motors. Once those engines leave Sterling they are yours with no warranty. Plus they have less HP and don't run as well as the 1075's. Although I can complain that today our 1075's have taken a crap with 6 hours. Mercury tried to tell us that they didn't have any problems, but Murphy's Law does work Now, they are flying someone in to fix it. Same happened in 98 with those sh*tty XR drives and the 575's. Blew 12 seals and had to threaten legal action on Mercury to have them finally redesign a seal. They said only 15% of the XR drives would have seal problems, so they weren't going to notify the customers. How do they make up for two summers of your boat sitting at a Powerquest factory?? Nothing. We got to sit at the Smoke on the Water Run on the docks while everyone else ran. I would agree that it should be up to the buyer to choose their power

Does anyone want to go into business and be CRT exclusive???? Hmmmmm.........

Such an angry person... Obviously JC's not fufilling other needs in your life.

Exactly. It seems all Mercury is saying is if you want full warranty you have to be running their drives with THEIR motors. I really don't blame them actually.

Chevy or Ford wouldn't honor a warranty if someone repowered their truck with something else.