I am looking to buy a used boat and wanting to get fisherman's views on how many hours on an engine would make you leery about purchasing the boat.

I’ve seen far more problems with very low hour motors than high. Typical texas boat should average 80-100 a year.
If it’s ten years old and has fifty hours I promise it’s going to cause problems.
I’d much rather have a thousand hours of maintained use.

Pat

Awww.
Thanks!

Bought my last boat that was 8yrs old, had 780hrs on it. Fished it for 6 more years until i hit a tree. Motor had 1370hrs on it, and they totalled the boat because fiberglass issures. Motor was still strong. My buddy has 1180 on his mercury proxs and still going strong.

Crab fishemen here in Seadrift typically put over 10,000 hours on a new motor, and they run the snot out of them. Motor will be so covered in slime you can't read the brand, but there they go.

I bought a 90 Yamaha that was eight years old with virtually zero hours, it was on a lifeboat on a 120' yacht. they ran it maybe twice, rain water collected in the lower unit and froze, and cracked it. I run a jet, so lower unit was not needed anyway. Think I got a great deal on that motor for $500? Think again, I've replaced every single electrical part on that motor, coils, ECM, stator, all because it just sat and never got exercised. So, use and maintenance is far more important than hours and no use.

I agree with Pat. Not getting used is FAR worse than 1000 hours. I sold a few Mercs with 900ish hours that still purred and hauled butt !
Hours don't bother me at all, and I buy and sell a LOT of boats.
Just my opinion of course !

Chad

On higher hour motors try and verify recent scheduled and unscheduled Maint. performed. Example, al lot of Mercury Opti Max motors are known to have air compressor failures between 400-600 hours. So you might ask if/when the compressor failed and was replaced.