Szyd

How many hours is to many?
Found a 89 Baja 250 sport with a 1000 hours.
I am completely new to boating I do not want to buy, just to drop what I paid for the boat into the boat.
Thanks

articfriends

iTrader: (1)

At 1000 hrs AND being a 89 (assuming stuff hasnt been rebuilt or replaced yet) its not if its going to break but when. Buy it right, drive it easy if replacing motor isnt in your budget

Szyd

It seems there are a lot of repowering and rebuilding going on, lots of the boats I have looked at have been repowerd or rebuilt. So it has me scared a bit. Are most of them due to running hard, it Is a performance boat, or is marine use just that hard on motors? I would like to test the waters with the family and time before spending to much. At the same time get the boat I want. Which is a Red 250 sport, man they are beautiful.
Thanks

Sydwayz

iTrader: (1)

This has been discussed before.

You can't compare car mileage to boat hours.
Your car shifts gears to cruise at lower RPMs.
99% of boats do not have this capability, so they are always running at a load, often high RPMs, and going "uphill both ways."


Too further complicate things, a boat might have 1000 hours on it...
995 at WFO and 5 at idle.
Or 955 at idle and 5 at WFO.

Only the later model Merc offerings with SmartCraft/PCMs can give you this breakdown of hours that's pertinent to how the engine has been treated.

articfriends

iTrader: (1)

It all comes down to money and how hard its ran and if oil changes been kept up, im sure somone will come on and tell us about how they got 1200 hours on their motor but for every 1 of those guys there are 10 who didnt get past 600 hours, 1000 hr motor is on borrowed time

tommymonza

Buy it right . If it's just a 330 horse 454 their a dime a dozen to replace.

I would take a high hour motor over a newly rebuilt by Who Knows Who any day

My buddy has over 2000 hours on his gas motors in his heavy azz cruiser that is being Wrung out at 4000 rpms to 17 knots and they have never had a valve cover off.

I would put 2000 hours on my parasail motors like nothing, many had 4000 before I pulled them.

Have a compression test done and have a good mechanic listen to the motor.

The Bravos drives are indestructible behind that little bit of power.
Only thing about a boat with that many hours the gimble and transom assembly gets real loose and most likely will need rebuilding or replacement which is going to run you 3 grand minuim .

articfriends

iTrader: (1)

And the money part is can you, will you spend 4 or 5 thousand to put another motor in a 10 or 12 thousand dollar boat when the time comes?

Trash

Check to make sure the hour meter is actually wired for engine run time and not ignition on time. Some boats have been wired such that the ignition was required to run the stereo, yet the motor was off but the hour meter marched on. This will unfortunately yield artificially high engine hours. Just something to check.

1000 hours would be evidence of a well used, yet not necessarily abused boat. As previous posts mentioned, marine motors are under continuous load unlike automotive applications.

tommymonza

I resemble that guy.

Yep what Articfriendse says.

Many motors began their death the second they were overheated. Than new impeller but did not change the old superheated oil.

You can run the crap out of them and they will take it , if you keep good fresh oil in them and don't overheat them
I have over the last 20 years, but you overheat them , they tend not to like that.

Szyd

Thank you all.
I don't want to race, that boat looks fast just sitting there. I do want to tube, cruise and fish with my family on small lakes and big such as lake Erie.
Probably not a bad idea to find a 454 to freshen up till the one in it goes.