frustrated with mercury racing
 

For now the THIRD time since I've had my 450Rs, Ive had an issue which is obviously covered by "Warranty" but now have to wait WEEKS before parts get here because, well, they are on backorder. I signed up for my first poker run ever, and with my "brand new" boat next weekend in Destin and now im essentially screwed because one of my motors is down. I understand COVID issues but, man we pay quite the premium for the 450Rs and when things happen that need to be fixed the parts are always on back order. Happened to my flush valve, fuel filters etc. Now its a FSM and an O2 sensor. Its just unbelievable that I've had my boat down well over 6-8 weeks this season because I'm waiting for parts.

Should've just gotten the 400R and had a plethora of parts available.

just venting....

Interesting that mercury has the parts to build the new complete engines but can’t support the existing fleet that’s in service. :party-smiley-004:

Exactly my point. Very quick to sell the new motors for $$$$ but, then when something breaks. "Sorry those parts are on backorder" well heck, pull it from one of those motors on a crate!!!!! I have a very sour taste with this issue and mercury. Not good business model from a consumer standpoint.

That's so annoying! Not fair and doesn't make sense. And then to top it off they don't extend the warranty length for the downtime!

Could be worse dealers in Michigan are scheduling Polaris RZR SXS warranty out till September!!!!

In MY line of work, (Caterpillar) if a part is on back order, we rob one off a NEW machine in the yard to keep the customer up and running ..

Guess Merc doesn't care much.. it's not like THEY have any competition. :(

Gator, I responded to your PM. I completely understand your frustration, but everything has changed due to the WuFlu. Supply chains have been slowed or even cut off and production is suffering. Place a 450 order and see how long it takes to get it. You’ll likely get it next year. We are really seeing the effects as a lot of rigging parts and props are backordered with no expectation on availability. That’s where we make most of our money. As frustrating as it may be, it’s only affecting your use of a pleasure boat. No one could’ve predicted or prepared for this but it will eventually get back to normal and life will go on. You’re not the only one in this boat, pun intended. Our livelihoods, as well as some guides and other commercial operations are being seriously affected, but there’s little to nothing that we can do about it.

Take my advise and calmly call Mercury customer service and state your case. You as a customer have way more pull than us as a dealer or even your boat builder. I’m not promising they can do anything, but it’s worth a phone call.

Last sentence of below quote is, ummm, welll....

May 1, 2020

”The Mercury Racing 450R set a new benchmark for outboard performance and design,” said Stuart Halley, Mercury Racing general manager. “Its inclusion as a Boating Industry Top Product acknowledges the creative talent and the engineering and manufacturing prowess of the entire staff at Mercury Racing, where we always run Wide Open.” “

construction and agriculture suppliers tend to realize where their $$ comes from. Merc could do the same if they cared.
Lack of competition as stated above is the real problem.

I ordered 2 ECM/fuel pump power relays 3 weeks ago which are in stock but waiting to ship!

Find a dealer who has 450s just hanging around in stock to ‘borrow’ parts from. I’ll help you out, no one has any.

Up to 3 weeks shipping delay for anything coming out of Fond du Lac, even if it’s in stock. Thanks China.

let me tell you, not much running wide open on my boat. They 100% should be pulling parts from motors and shipping to customers. #1 we already paid for them #2, we have a warranty for situations like this. #3 what’s the sense in purchasing the “industry top product” if when it fails you have no reasonable way to get it back working.

I think I’ll bring a bunch of paddles and my crew and I can paddle the Nortech on the poker run. #wideopen #nortechkayak

They can't even cast sbc exhaust manifolds correctly and won’t change it until all sets have been sold. Their current sets of castings are way off.

See:
https://www.offshoreonly.com/forums/...ng-issues.html

How long have small block merc’s been around ? Must still be rocket science. Lololol.

This gives us so much faith in such a world class manufacturing facility , huh. :confused:

its like everybody is using the kung-flu to make excuses as for why you cant get parts, wont answer phone calls (manning marine i'm talking to you) , cant get to your problem for months ( but if you wanted to buy a new one , well step right in) and other excuses for poor service. be the squeaky wheel is my best advice.

[QUOTE=davidwademarine;4751686]Find a dealer who has 450s just hanging around in stock to ‘borrow’ parts from. I’ll help you out, no one has any.



Understood.
But it still boils down to Merc the manufacturer.
Why not hold back the release of a new product until the support is in place?
Or do we have two separate definitions of “support”?

I here ya , I’m going though a similar warranty issue with mercury with one of my 2019 150 four strokes . I have 67 hours on my motors and one motor has an oil leak , that is coming from a casting flaw in the adapter plate. Mercury had the dealer pull power head , adapter plate , oil pan , lower unit to confirm issue . Now my motor sits (In pieces) waiting on back ordered adapter plate and some gaskets. The parts back order date keeps getting pushed back. I called Mercury and said why don’t they just replace the complete motor . They said no because it has more than 30 hours. ( I said you got to be kidding me ). I said this problem didn’t just start at 67 hours if it is a casting flaw. It’s been there since day one, . I asked them who is gonna reimburse me for my slip fee that I can’t get a refund on . There was no response other than we are working hard trying to get the parts out . I asked why not take the parts from production, They said o we can’t do that. They could easily take the motor back , give me a replacement, and they can fix it and sell it as a CPO. Not happy with Mercury.....

All reasons why I’m considering getting a CC with Yamahas, Suzuki’s or Honda’s on the back. I won’t be buying a new boat (can’t afford that) and I know they all have issues. But, purchase price is cheaper and parts are also. I personally think all three of them are more reliable than Mercury, might not be as fast as a boat with Merc power, but will be more reliable.

I work at a popular marina at LOTO. I hear and see these problems daily. Mother mercury has the market and they know it. It’s a shame they can’t make better products. With all the R&D they do and the price they charge. Then to top it off there customer service sucks.

It's not just Mercury. All areas of recreation have been slammed with delays. In the Auto Parts industry we are surviving on a decent back stock of inventory but I have heard horror stories from the bicycle shop down the road. Tried to order 4 stroke suzuki for the parents' pontoon boat.... backorder with no eta. USA made parts show up as fast as ever, it's time for a shift in suppliers.....

I understand that but, in that scenario STOP selling new motors and use them for parts for the customers who already dropped their $$$ and entered that warranty agreement with you.

Did anyone verify that there is not a part that will cross reference? Many manufactures have other part #s "not just the mercury #" and you might be up and running. Bad mouthing the guy that you are depending on to have fix your problem usually doesn't get you to the finish line any sooner or yield a better result-as much as do understand your frustration.

Joe

I helped merc in my situation. Not many will go ss far as I did. Also Gave’m over a year of patience. They just kept giving me empty promises.

There cones a point in time when enough is enough and a f u becomes warranted.

Many situations are different I guess. However......

As far cross referencing for the OP, let’s do it. As others know here with the I/O’s i’m orety good at that. :)

Any parts look up yet for the 450’s ?

Another part of the equation is "just in time " manufacturing. They don't have bins of parts waiting for assembly at the plant.

I thought the beauty of going with outboards was the shift into reliable power over trying to make a truck engine work. I guess at the head of the performance envelope there will always be issues.

Hopefully this flu thing has exposed how vulnerable we are when outsourcing needed supplies. The fact that we’re able to just be upset about missing a boating season is a good thing if we don’t have larger issues to deal with.

Best of luck to the op. It sucks when you shell out massive money and can’t even use the product.

I feel your pain. My NT has been in the shop since late March, getting new engines built and rigged along with new transom assemblies among other things. We have repeatedly been "on hold" waiting on parts deliveries. One of the biggest obstacles was a lot of the engine parts were coming from Michigan, who runs Michigan?.... The liberal governor that wants to keep Michigan closed until election day.... So in short, I'm hoping to be on the water for a nice 6 week boating year in about a month.

So, how many other 450’s are waiting for fuel control units 02 sensors ? How many where earlier and repaired ? 1,5,10,100 ? How amall was stock of these parts ?

Im sharing my personal factual experience with Mercury, if it comes across as bad mouthing well then at least I’m not the only person that perceives this as being a problem. My intent isn’t to bad mouth rather to raise awareness in the Powerboating community that despite actually choosing to fork out a truly astronomical amount of money per 450R you run into these issues. It’s bad business. You shouldn’t as a business build such a high end motor if you can’t service it with parts. There has to be foresight, we just built 1000 motors, each those motors will need their service, we should have at least 1000 of part “x” in stock, etc.

And yes, the more frequent my motor goes down and the parts requires to fix it are on backorder the more frustrating it becomes.


Update: I have since spoke to Merc and they are trying to locate parts needed. Which I appreciate. But, there are many others out there waiting too.

1st - Having a broken boat truly sucks & if parts aren't available that definitely adds to the suckage. We've all been there, and saying that doesn't make it any better because while my favorite boater is me, I'm sure your favorite boater is you.

I don't know how the big M works exactly in terms of production and allocation, but I've grown up in the automotive industry so don't shoot the messenger, but let me provide a bit of perspective that's being overlooked.

1st - As previously mentioned, "Just in time" manufacturing is a reality and means as the last "widget" in the bin is being installed on a vehicle, a rail car is unloading more "widgets" and re-supplying the inventory in the plant. Most "widget" suppliers have their business model in tune and have production to match orders and don't overproduce, because it's money on the shelf instead of in the bank account. Now add a pandemic/earthquake/tsunami/fire into the mix and break not only the supply chain, but also interrupt production and you have not only unhappy customers, but also unhappy shareholders. Now, have a few "widget" suppliers close their doors, and you truly have a Charlie Foxtrot as manufacturers scramble to find replacements. As far as the automotive industry goes, I'm not sure the auto manufacturers have even figured out which of all their suppliers are still in business. The more complex the supply chain, the more "Charlie Foxtrotted" the situation is. I've got a buddy in the footwear industry and we were drinking and solving problems and he said "I've got a plant full of vibram over here, a plant full of leather over there, and the plant that puts them together is closed and we've got dealers screaming for product".

2nd - as far as stealing parts from production - here's something to think about, and it's not pretty:

As an oversimplification, the manufacturer sells vehicles to the dealer. Dealers have vehicles they've earned through the sales & allocation process which aren't produced yet. (We've got trucks scheduled right now with targeted production weeks into September, and I believe October). Some of those vehicles are ordered specifically for a customer (special order) and it's also common on high demand stuff (everything right now) to "sell" an inbound unit before it gets here (we have several un-produced vehicles spoken for right now).

At this point you can probably see the issue with robbing parts off the production line, at least as it pertains to the auto industry: Every Single Vehicle is sold to a dealer prior to it even getting to the plant and going down the assembly line.

Stealing a part from production means taking a widget off the assy line to give to a dealer to fix "customer Smith", and is literally stealing the part from a dealer who's been waiting for the vehicle and may have it sold to "customer Jones". Those parts you want to steal from the assembly line aren't theirs to give, especially if the part is robbed from a vehicle waiting for transport...when the tires hit the ground off the assembly line, the dealer is billed for the vehicle...up until that point the vehicle is merely "spoken for" but as soon as it falls (sometimes I think literally, but that's another story) off the line belongs to the dealer because we've paid for it.

All this doesn't lessen the suck factor, but it is why it's very difficult to rob from production. Your dealer is no doubt screaming at Merc to rob one from production because "I can't get the part for a customer but you're building and shipping new motors every day". However, the dealer that owns the motor Merc wants to rob the part from is saying "Not a frickin' chance you're stealing MY part because I have a customer waiting on this motor". It s a bad situation.

Here's the ugly truth in terms of "bad business model to not rob parts for a customer off an engine in a crate"...let me add the rest of the sentence for you..."...off a DEALER's engine in a crate which has already been paid for (and who may have a customer waiting on that engine for his boat). How pissed are you likely to be if you bought a boat at the boat show, have been waiting for months for you dealer to get the engine from Merc so they can rig your boat, and your dealer calls you and tells you "Uh, it's gonna be another couple weeks because we found out they robbed parts from your engine, so you're probably going to have to make different vacation plans because there's no way your boat is going to be ready like we promised. Sorry 'bout that".

Yeah, it sucks, and all I've done is piss you off further, but we have the same issues and arguments with parts in the automotive industry. "Backordered" is a reality and GM/Ford/Ram is making vehicles everyday with the parts we're waiting on to fix a customers vehicle. And I think sometimes the definition of "backorder" is "We're planting the trees to make the boxes to ship your parts in". ****.

If there's any good news at all - at least in my opinion - is that your issue is with an OB, and Merc is smart enough to know they have competition in that market and you can vote with your $$ the next time you're shopping.

I would think your dealer would be encouraging you to politely be the squeaky wheel on the Merc customer assistance line, and they should be burning up the parts locator and phone trying to beg borrow or steal a part from some other dealer. Or rob the part off an inventory motor, (also a tough decision if demand is high and supply is low) if there is such a thing. And they should be communicating with Merc daily..the squeaky wheel does tend to get greased.

The problem as I see it is the manufacturer must balance having a supply of parts they know are going to break and be available to service customers against answering to shareholders who want every last part to go on a high demand product they can't produce enough of.

It's like airlines deliberately over-booking a flight; I think it's a bad biz decision but every airline does it, so I must be missing something.

In my opinion, the bad biz decision isn't Merc not robbing a part off someone's spoken for engine, but rather in Mercury not requiring the supplier to be able to produce - and Mercury purchase and provide to dealers - sufficient parts to service their product.

I'm really not trying to be "Richard Cranium"...it's just my $ .02 based on what we see in the automotive industry & I'm sure it doesn't help because at the end of the day, you've got a new boat you can't use and summer is short. That sucks.

I hope you're in the water soon.

d

SLIPPERY- your points are all very valid and I have absolutely considered them during this. Thank you for taking the time to draw parallels with the auto industry. This kind of thing unfortunately happens all the time in many industries, a balance between supply and demand and Mercury's Inventory vs COGS should be better handled considering the demand for motors in general. More specifically, essentially a $70,000 high performance motor (which is the equivalent of an ENTIRE well equipped luxury or even high performance vehicle (GT350s, M4's etc) that has an issue with it should have accessible parts. I totally agree, and would be equally upset by my motor being dismantled at the expense of divy'ing parts for someone else's motor and their plans. However, the same concept should be applied to existing owners and their motors/plans.

Perhaps I am fresh in this arena and have higher expectations for the response/repair of a high dollar piece of equipment. When it boils down to it, no matter the boat manufacturer/model you have these bad boys on (because they truly are great motors!) I have three of them sitting on my transom and that's a huge investment and hard earned money sitting back there and being told some parts are on backorder just burns especially when you invest and look forward to a fun trip! Of course there are variables we all face which ruin our plans, namely weather, and in this case proper/safe functioning of the vessels.

Update: After calling Mercury Racing and candidly discussing with them what the situation was, they have responded in a very professional manner and are working to track down some parts for the 450R which I sincerely appreciated. I'm glad this forum allows an outlet to the community to vent and seek assistance. At the end of the day, we're all here to enjoy the fruits of our labor and get out to disconnect on the water...especially given the current state of the world. Mercury is a giant in Marine power applications, and I hope they can "catch up" to the all the motors they are putting out.

[QUOTE=GatorMD;4751761]It’s bad business. You shouldn’t as a business build such a high end motor if you can’t service it with parts.


Bingo.
Everything else is just noise.

Good to hear. Hopefully they can make something happen for you. Keep us updated. I’m here to help in any way possible.

Just a head’s up for everyone. This isn’t specific to Mercury. The other major brands have experienced backorder shortages and shipping delays much worse as most of their parts are manufactured in China. Our local Yamaha and Suzuki dealers can’t even get many basic maintenance items as the supply has all but dried up.

I believe all the other major brands and there customers are experiencing the same thing with back orders and shortage of supply. Every industry is. And it would still suck to have your new or used boat sitting because your waiting on parts. But, the purchase price of them is way cheaper than mercury. It might not taste so bad, when your waiting a little longer than expected. That said, I just had my 250 Suzuki serviced here at a little marina and they had all parts in stock.

Gator- I'm pretty sure your dealer could assist if they didn't automatically want to default to Mercury since it's their issue.

Nor-Tech & other manufacturers like MTI even Statement order and receive complete Merc 450's w/o issue.

Engines are hung on Nor-Tech Transoms some 2+ mos before boats are complete, I think it comes down to the relationship and whether someone wants to go the extra mile for you.

If you know what you need Ben Robertson at BAR Marine may be able to help you, he's in Jacksonboro, SC (near Charlestion, SC) & very tight w/ Mercury.

My fuel pump went out on my Mastercraft. Was told 4-5 weeks with no guarntee it would be then....it's been 2 already. Fingers crossed I get it sometime soon!

Trying to install a set a 300R’s on my Superboat. One thing after another you need this relay you need this sensor you need that harness mercury said they were sending it out right away between them and UPS being overwhelmed Waiting three weeks easily for stuff. Certainly feel your pain

Very well said. I just passed my 25 year anniversary at the big T - for a minute, I thought you were talking about big T. LOL The auto industry is crazy and rewarding.

Been there done that! lol

Sure hate that the OP is dealing with this. I'd be pissed too.

Don't you sorta wonder what the total spare parts allocation exists for this engine ? I'm betting slim to none.

Kind of glad I have BBC that I can get parts for almost anywhere. Now cross me fingers that tie XR drive holds up.

Padraig

I thought OB's are never down, run for ever without a glitch, Im never going back to a stern drive EVER :D...............hope you get the parts soon OP

Update:

Those parts eventually came in, and when we splashed the boat for sea trial. Sure enough, the motor didnt run. My mercury mechanic went through all the sensors and the PCMa I believe was only reading 0.7v when it should be 5 like its "b" and "c" counterparts. He spent the afternoon that day on the phone with mercury and they think its ECM harness that needs replacing (which you guessed is ALSO on backorder). So he put the cowling back on and guess what, the motor ran beautifully. We eventually took it out for sea trial and the boat ran hard without issues.

So, I decided to bite the bullet and go on the poker run. After my ride to Destin at cruising speed without opening it up it ran fine. Next morning we fired it up at the marina without problem. So far so good however, when we went to get on plane the motor bogged out and eventually caught up to the port and center but limited me to about 5100rpm which was my max that day. Next day, the actual poker run, it limited me to 3500ish, slipped in guardian and the P and C motor were also affected. FML. Fuel consumption during that time also shot WAY up as that stbd motor was running VERY rich and blowing a decent black smoke trail. I burned about 120g in 50miles.

Ultimately we completed the poker run causing around 45mph which was still a fun experience being my first poker run, but VERY frustrating with boats passing us.

Fast forward over a week, I believe the parts are finally here and will be installed soon. The saga continues! Hoping I can have all 3 motors running for Tampa poker run in late September since I had already signed up. I'm fortunate that Destin is near Pensacola and just took the boat back to the marina. I certainly will not be trailering the boat to Tampa if this issue is not resolved.

Same here, broke a prop shaft on one of my M8’s and they’re saying backordered until Sept 8. You would think a prop shaft wouldn’t be that hard to come by. 🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️