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Bertramp posted 10-29-2012 10:08 AM ET (US)
I was out of town, the marina moved my boat to haul it, and an engine that ran perfectly on 10/21 now has a hole in the block. The engine is a 1996 Optimax 225 that repotedly had a new block installed approximately 100-hour before I bought it, however it was bought at auction and no warrantees were conveyed. $15,000 for a new engine is REALLY not in the budget right now. What are thoughts on and what has experience been with getting a new powerhead?
Thanks
jimh posted 10-29-2012 11:54 AM ET (US)
A Mercury OptiMax c.1996 is from the earliest generation of that design. Would a new power head give you all the latest improvements? Or would you be bolting on all your 16-year-old pumps, compressors, regulator, injectors, controllers, hoses, harnesses, and so on to a new bare block?
Power head replacement usually involves a very substantial amount of labor expense. You might consider just looking for a newer Mercury engine, perhaps another OptiMax, that could be easily substituted. With so many people changing over to more modern engines, there ought to be some decent used OptiMax engines around.
Have you pursued any remedy with the marina? From your narrative I got the impression the damage occurred while they were running the motor. What did they have to say about that?
kwik_wurk posted 10-29-2012 12:21 PM ET (US)
You should also look up the failure mode of the 225's.

If I remember correctly it it was a cooling anomaly that occurred on some of the lower cylinders if the engine was rev'd up too quickly before completely warm. --- I would check this, as there have been detailed discussions on this issue.
L H G posted 10-29-2012 01:30 PM ET (US)
I think the first year of the 225 Optimax was 1999.
boatdryver posted 10-30-2012 09:03 AM ET (US)
Yes, there should be used Optimax's around at a reasonable price.
Three years ago I wanted to buy a Dauntless 22 with a low hour circa 2000-2002 Optimax 200 and repower it. The quite large Mercury dealer in Oakland, CA said he could not give me one dollar trade in for the low hour Optimax because he would never be able to sell it!
Yet there are a great many people out there getting good use out of these motors.
JimL
Hilinercc posted 10-30-2012 12:43 PM ET (US)
You are aware of Mercury's remanufacturing program, aren't you? You can get a replacement powerhead from Mercury with all the upgrades.
We do this all the time in the military, and its available to everyone.
I think its called the Merc Re-Man program.
jimh posted 10-30-2012 12:58 PM ET (US)
Yes, the Mercury power head rebuilding program and reselling program is somewhat unique in the outboard engine manufacturing business. The ability for Mercury to offer for sale so many factory rebuilt power heads is created by their somewhat unique position of having to supply many new outboard engines to customers whose Mercury outboard engine failed under warranty in exchange for the failed engines. Rather than just melt those failed engines down into aluminum ingots, Mercury remanufactures them and sells them. I think at one time they called the program the Pacemaker Engine Program.
L H G posted 10-30-2012 02:53 PM ET (US)
Well, as usual Jim's negative post regarding Mercury re-manfacturing is incorrect. You can read about it here, (including the detailed PDF) and it indicates these are NOT necessarily whole engine warranty situations at all, but component wear, tear and mechanical situations of well used engines where an existing engine, gearcase, etc has to be rebuilt or repaired.
http://www.mercurymarine.com/repower/outboard/remanufactured-engines/
Sounds like a smart business operation that other outboard manufacturers would be smart to copy as a service to their customers and to improve their engine's service life.
The old "Pacemaker" program are now called CPO engines, and I believe they are mostly the warranty situations. These entire outboards are scarce and hard to come by. There is little choice, and is only what is available at a given time.
jimh posted 10-31-2012 08:57 AM ET (US)
As usual, my rather objective statement about Mercury was not sufficient to satisfy Larry's brand-booster notion of fairness--I wasn't sufficiently over the moon for Mercury.
If you watch the video (linked below), you will hear Mercury themselves explain how they get their engines for re-manufacturing. They say the same thing I said: they get the power heads from ones customers "returned." That is a rather crafty way to describe engines that failed under warranty. I don't know of any other way that people return their outboard after they bought it to get a new one unless they get a replacement under warranty. When was the last time you heard of someone buying a new outboard motor, running it for a while, and then "returning" it to the manufacturer. I will be anxious to hear Larry's spin on that.
Again, this operation is unique in the outboard engine business. Mercury has so many engines to remanufacture it had to build a specialized plant and special division to handle the volume. Watch this four-year-old presentation on the remanufactuting of Mercury outboard engines which have been "returned" by customers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkigrSXAVsQ
jimh posted 10-31-2012 09:37 AM ET (US)
The video notes that the newly built plant in Wisconsin is just for outboard engines. Mercury has a separate facility for rebuilding their inboard and sterndrive engines. The plant is mentioned as being about 100,000-square-feet.
I think we could make an approximation about the percentage of Mercury outboard engine that fail under warranty and are remanufactured by comparing the size of the remanufacturing plant to the size of the original production plants. For example, let's say that Mercury Marine has two plants with 500,000-sqaure feet for original manufacturing of outboard engines. They'd have 1,000,000-square-feet of plant. We compare this to the 100,000-square-feet of plant for remanufacturing and find the ration to be 1:10. Therefore we could approximate the following relationship: ten percent of Mercury engines fail under warranty and are remanufactured.
jimh posted 10-31-2012 09:55 AM ET (US)
The feature of the Mercury re-manufacturing plant video which I found to be most unusual was the mention that the re-manufacturing of outboard engines is done on a one-at-a-time basis and by a single skilled workman. This is not a production line operation. Mercury Marine even spins this notion of hand-assembled as something special, likening it to the way race engines are built for NASCAR. (That is quite a stretch as a race engine costs $500,00 or more, but we should never be surprised with the bravado of a Verado-maker.)
The video also gives the notion that the remanufactured engine will contain a very high percentage of new parts, particularly the hoses, wires, and bolt-on components that attach to the power head, and even new internal power head components like pistons and connecting rods. I think this may be misleading. Here is why:
If the remanufactured engine has all new components other than the engine block, crankshaft, cylinder heads, and other major castings, the cost of components in the engine would be almost the same as a new engine, save for the large castings and machined parts. The video implies that even these large parts are carefully machined and processed. The cylinders are bored and honed, for example, just as a new engine block would be. The video shows the engines even being repainted.
The labor to accomplish the rebuild must be greater than the labor to initially assemble because you first have the labor of disassembly to tear down the used engine. And the assembler for remanufacturing is probably a more skilled worker, being paid at a higher rate.
When the engine is finished being remanufactured it is sold at a lower cost than a new engine, providing less revenue to cover the manufacturing costs. In the long run, I can't see that this operation could be profitable, unless the majority of the remanufacturing were not as substantial as the video suggests.

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Author	Topic: New Powerhead
Bertramp	posted 10-29-2012 10:08 AM ET (US) I was out of town, the marina moved my boat to haul it, and an engine that ran perfectly on 10/21 now has a hole in the block. The engine is a 1996 Optimax 225 that repotedly had a new block installed approximately 100-hour before I bought it, however it was bought at auction and no warrantees were conveyed. $15,000 for a new engine is REALLY not in the budget right now. What are thoughts on and what has experience been with getting a new powerhead? Thanks
jimh	posted 10-29-2012 11:54 AM ET (US) A Mercury OptiMax c.1996 is from the earliest generation of that design. Would a new power head give you all the latest improvements? Or would you be bolting on all your 16-year-old pumps, compressors, regulator, injectors, controllers, hoses, harnesses, and so on to a new bare block? Power head replacement usually involves a very substantial amount of labor expense. You might consider just looking for a newer Mercury engine, perhaps another OptiMax, that could be easily substituted. With so many people changing over to more modern engines, there ought to be some decent used OptiMax engines around. Have you pursued any remedy with the marina? From your narrative I got the impression the damage occurred while they were running the motor. What did they have to say about that?
kwik_wurk	posted 10-29-2012 12:21 PM ET (US) You should also look up the failure mode of the 225's. If I remember correctly it it was a cooling anomaly that occurred on some of the lower cylinders if the engine was rev'd up too quickly before completely warm. --- I would check this, as there have been detailed discussions on this issue.
L H G	posted 10-29-2012 01:30 PM ET (US) I think the first year of the 225 Optimax was 1999.
boatdryver	posted 10-30-2012 09:03 AM ET (US) Yes, there should be used Optimax's around at a reasonable price. Three years ago I wanted to buy a Dauntless 22 with a low hour circa 2000-2002 Optimax 200 and repower it. The quite large Mercury dealer in Oakland, CA said he could not give me one dollar trade in for the low hour Optimax because he would never be able to sell it! Yet there are a great many people out there getting good use out of these motors. JimL
Hilinercc	posted 10-30-2012 12:43 PM ET (US) You are aware of Mercury's remanufacturing program, aren't you? You can get a replacement powerhead from Mercury with all the upgrades. We do this all the time in the military, and its available to everyone. I think its called the Merc Re-Man program.
jimh	posted 10-30-2012 12:58 PM ET (US) Yes, the Mercury power head rebuilding program and reselling program is somewhat unique in the outboard engine manufacturing business. The ability for Mercury to offer for sale so many factory rebuilt power heads is created by their somewhat unique position of having to supply many new outboard engines to customers whose Mercury outboard engine failed under warranty in exchange for the failed engines. Rather than just melt those failed engines down into aluminum ingots, Mercury remanufactures them and sells them. I think at one time they called the program the Pacemaker Engine Program.
L H G	posted 10-30-2012 02:53 PM ET (US) Well, as usual Jim's negative post regarding Mercury re-manfacturing is incorrect. You can read about it here, (including the detailed PDF) and it indicates these are NOT necessarily whole engine warranty situations at all, but component wear, tear and mechanical situations of well used engines where an existing engine, gearcase, etc has to be rebuilt or repaired. http://www.mercurymarine.com/repower/outboard/remanufactured-engines/ Sounds like a smart business operation that other outboard manufacturers would be smart to copy as a service to their customers and to improve their engine's service life. The old "Pacemaker" program are now called CPO engines, and I believe they are mostly the warranty situations. These entire outboards are scarce and hard to come by. There is little choice, and is only what is available at a given time.
jimh	posted 10-31-2012 08:57 AM ET (US) As usual, my rather objective statement about Mercury was not sufficient to satisfy Larry's brand-booster notion of fairness--I wasn't sufficiently over the moon for Mercury. If you watch the video (linked below), you will hear Mercury themselves explain how they get their engines for re-manufacturing. They say the same thing I said: they get the power heads from ones customers "returned." That is a rather crafty way to describe engines that failed under warranty. I don't know of any other way that people return their outboard after they bought it to get a new one unless they get a replacement under warranty. When was the last time you heard of someone buying a new outboard motor, running it for a while, and then "returning" it to the manufacturer. I will be anxious to hear Larry's spin on that. Again, this operation is unique in the outboard engine business. Mercury has so many engines to remanufacture it had to build a specialized plant and special division to handle the volume. Watch this four-year-old presentation on the remanufactuting of Mercury outboard engines which have been "returned" by customers. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkigrSXAVsQ
jimh	posted 10-31-2012 09:37 AM ET (US) The video notes that the newly built plant in Wisconsin is just for outboard engines. Mercury has a separate facility for rebuilding their inboard and sterndrive engines. The plant is mentioned as being about 100,000-square-feet. I think we could make an approximation about the percentage of Mercury outboard engine that fail under warranty and are remanufactured by comparing the size of the remanufacturing plant to the size of the original production plants. For example, let's say that Mercury Marine has two plants with 500,000-sqaure feet for original manufacturing of outboard engines. They'd have 1,000,000-square-feet of plant. We compare this to the 100,000-square-feet of plant for remanufacturing and find the ration to be 1:10. Therefore we could approximate the following relationship: ten percent of Mercury engines fail under warranty and are remanufactured.
jimh	posted 10-31-2012 09:55 AM ET (US) The feature of the Mercury re-manufacturing plant video which I found to be most unusual was the mention that the re-manufacturing of outboard engines is done on a one-at-a-time basis and by a single skilled workman. This is not a production line operation. Mercury Marine even spins this notion of hand-assembled as something special, likening it to the way race engines are built for NASCAR. (That is quite a stretch as a race engine costs $500,00 or more, but we should never be surprised with the bravado of a Verado-maker.) The video also gives the notion that the remanufactured engine will contain a very high percentage of new parts, particularly the hoses, wires, and bolt-on components that attach to the power head, and even new internal power head components like pistons and connecting rods. I think this may be misleading. Here is why: If the remanufactured engine has all new components other than the engine block, crankshaft, cylinder heads, and other major castings, the cost of components in the engine would be almost the same as a new engine, save for the large castings and machined parts. The video implies that even these large parts are carefully machined and processed. The cylinders are bored and honed, for example, just as a new engine block would be. The video shows the engines even being repainted. The labor to accomplish the rebuild must be greater than the labor to initially assemble because you first have the labor of disassembly to tear down the used engine. And the assembler for remanufacturing is probably a more skilled worker, being paid at a higher rate. When the engine is finished being remanufactured it is sold at a lower cost than a new engine, providing less revenue to cover the manufacturing costs. In the long run, I can't see that this operation could be profitable, unless the majority of the remanufacturing were not as substantial as the video suggests.