"Rollie, I'm fairly certai
"Rollie, I'm fairly certain our experiences with regards to how common motor failures occur are somewhat different.
You live in an area where it's probably a fair guess that most outboards see hundreds if not thousands of hours use in a season. In BC motors tend to blow due to extensive use - they reach their lifespan - out here, and in much of the country, motors die from under-use coupled with lack of proper maintenance and storage practices.
Where I run, 50 hours of use in a season is LOTS for the average motor.
While I don't doubt that a well used, regularly maintained 4 stroke is durable, for most boaters away from the coasts, that's just not the case.
You wouldn't park your car for 6 or more months on end, then without so much as an oil change, take it out on the highway and put the pedal to the mat for 3 or 4 hours, then return it to the driveway for another few weeks before taking it out again - then do that year after year and expect it to last. Yet that is exactly how outboards are treated in most of the country.
Where I am it's not uncommon to find a 10 year old motor, with less than 200 hours of run time, that has never seen a new part since the day it came off the assembly line.
That's why I believe that a 4 stroke will be a severe disappointment over the longer run to most "recreational boaters". They just won't put the money in to properly care for them, because they just don't use them enough and won't spend money on something they are not using.
Yet, they will expect them to keep going the way old 2 strokes did, which could be neglected and abused and would still fire up every spring...
So for the areas where I boat, and the people that use boats "occassionally" I will still recommend that they look at Optimax, Etec, HPDI or DFI Tohatsu's.
Yes, things can still go wrong, but they will take alot more neglect, so in 20 years they can still be running (as they are hitting the 300-400 hour mark), long after their neighbours 4 stroke has been scrapped because it "costs too much to fix" from all the neglect it had suffered..."