Repower in dilemma!

[Mupster]

Also consider the range at which you fish and the type of fishing you do?
Do you troll all day for billfish?
Are you running 300km round trips when you go out?
do you drift fish a lot?
All of the above will require a decent 4 stroke or you simply wont have the capacity. How big are your fuel tanks?

If your only running 20km out and anchoring up, then investment in brand new expensive 4 strokes may not be the best financial choice. buy a set of second hand 2 strokes possibly for the best option from a pure cost perspective.

Lets not forget the added enjoyment of a nice quiet set of 4 strokes off the back.

as for etecs, I do rate them very highly.
I owned a 175 for a while. Id never own one for offshore boating though. The oil cost is crazy! Id often use 300l to 400l of fuel in a trip for roughly 6-8litres of oil. At $80 for a 4l bottle that's over $150 ontop of fuel each time.
Added to that, If you go away to remote places fishing for a week and snag a good spell of weather often the small towns don't even stock the etec oil.

I plan on going everywhere I can.
2x150ltr tanks.
Yes secondhand 2 strokes will leave lots of money for fuel but I'd like nice quiet 4 Strokes motors too.
ETecs I agree?

[Andy56]

$80 for 4l? Either prices have skyrocketed or you typoed . I used to buy 20ltrs for $60.
I take that back, just had a quick look at prices, ouch !!
So what are the draw backs of using TCW-3 with the proper settings? Apart from the obvious xd100 is better.

[scottar]

$80 for 4l? Either prices have skyrocketed or you typoed . I used to buy 20ltrs for $60.
I take that back, just had a quick look at prices, ouch !!
So what are the draw backs of using TCW-3 with the proper settings? Apart from the obvious xd100 is better.

Uses a bit more oil and makes more smoke. My 200HO burns XD100 somewhere between 75:1 and 100:1 ratio at a guess. Given the relatively small number of hours your typical pleasure boat does (mine at least) I have been running on the same 20 litre bucket for the best part of 2.5 years and had one service in that time. As with all things some engines suit some one persons usage better than others. A lot of crabbers in my neck of the woods run E-Tecs as having a service done every 3 weeks on a 4 stroke during crab season is inconvenient at best and bloody expensive at worst - do your own servicing and the maths changes significantly though - still have the down time but for a basic service (oil change) that would be minimal.

The E-Tecs oil burn being computer controlled can vary from install to install as well. To the best of my knowledge, things like running over or under pitched can cause higher oil use. Engine temperature is also a factor as well I believe. The other issue that can arise is if the installing dealer has inadvertently (or otherwise) set the engine to run on a lower spec oil thus making it use more.

There are certain aspects of the E-Tec I love but there are some I could happily go without in a re-power situation. At idle noise level being one of them. I don't see reliability as a point of concern - even if mine was to let me down it is now an eleven year old engine that has performed flawlessly to date - nothing runs forever. There are failures across the entire spectrum of brands - a lot of which may not even be due to the engine itself - all modern engines are particularly touchy when it comes to fuel quality.

Regardless though, the OP doesn't want them - he want's 4 strokes. His boat - his prerogative for whatever his reasons.

[FINKNN]

Hi Flex,

When you say bum heavy, how low does your cat actually sit in the water? I have a 5.6 Sportsman with twin 115 etecs (I think they are similar weight?) and when fueled up 230L and with 2 POB the bottom of the rear platform sits just on water level. Just curious if this is normal and how other sharkcats sit at stern.

[catshark]

i have the 500 sportsman with 70 hp suzuki weight around 165kg per motor on pods(member shortfuse old boat) and it sits the same at rest with the rear platform near water level or just above. only ever had half a litre max sea water come back in thru the scupper. As for the repower dilemma , forget the 70 yamahas, get the pods, get the mercs or the suzies and when your cruising out there comfortable with the nice quiet sound of the motors humming and no stinky smoke, it bring a smile to your face. once you go cat , you never go back, once you know four stroke. you'll forget the two stroke.

[Short Fuse]

Hi Catshark. I hope you are enjoying the old boat and getting plenty of good fishing in. Its hard to get around that it is now over three years since I sold her to upgrade to the Seatrek.

When I did the repower on that boat, we did the trials to ensure that the bigger pods would carry the extra weight of the 4 strokes before committing to the new pods and motors. It carried the weight brilliantly, and gave us just on a 40% improvement in fuel economy over the original 70hp Yammie 2 strokes that had 1200 hours on them. The 2 strokes used to give me around 1km to the litre and the Suzukis averaged out at 1.4km per litre across an entire trip.

cheers

Jeff

[Toygut]

Have you looked at the tohatsu 90hp 2 strokes. 135kg ea.

Sent from my SM-G950F using Ausfish mobile app

[catshark]

Hi Catshark. I hope you are enjoying the old boat and getting plenty of good fishing in. Its hard to get around that it is now over three years since I sold her to upgrade to the Seatrek.

When I did the repower on that boat, we did the trials to ensure that the bigger pods would carry the extra weight of the 4 strokes before committing to the new pods and motors. It carried the weight brilliantly, and gave us just on a 40% improvement in fuel economy over the original 70hp Yammie 2 strokes that had 1200 hours on them. The 2 strokes used to give me around 1km to the litre and the Suzukis averaged out at 1.4km per litre across an entire trip.

cheers

Jeff

Hi Shortfuse, yes love the cat, best boat ive had.Got her on a new alloy trailer now... fuel usage has to be the forefront of any consideration these days along with power and reliability. i cant believe how good the suzies are on fuel, reliability and soooo quiet...

[Mupster]

Toy gut,
Yamaha 90 2strokes are better and lighter, so if I went the 2 stroke path the Yamahas would be the pick I think.

[docaster]

Another consideration would be counter rotation, making the boat balance better. Not sure what size you have to go before counter rotation is offered. That would be part of my consideration.