Looks like Evinrude outboards will no longer be produced.

https://www.wired2fish.com/news/brp-discontinues-evinrude-mercury-to-support-boat-packages/

Wow, had not heard about this yet. Thanks for sharing the news. I do wonder if they'll continue to support existing customers with warranty and spare parts.

Interesting trajectory for Evinrude.

When I started guiding at Lake Fork in the early 90's they couldn't have given a free outboard to an every day on the water guide. By 2015 they were challenging Yamaha as the choice of the professionals.

And Gunny is right about the global saltwater market. Our guides in Belize were "Yamaha or I'll just pole it away from the dock"

Evinrude tried to buy the market for a few years as they were offering rediculous discounts to guides and pro fisherman to get some engines on transoms to try and push the E-Tech. I knew guides and pros who got delayed billed engines at as much as 40% discount under dealer cost.

Been a slow decline but ultimately they couldn't compete with Yam or Merc. Plus I think they didn't want to start from scratch on a new 4 stroke. I doubt the EPA was going to let them go much longer with the 2 stroke.

26 Power said:

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Wow, had not heard about this yet. Thanks for sharing the news. I do wonder if they'll continue to support existing customers with warranty and spare parts.

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"We will continue to supply customers and our dealer network service parts and will honour our manufacturer limited warranties, plus offer select programs to manage inventory. These decisions will impact 650 employees globally."

Ugh hate my etec so much and now not sure how this will affect service going forward or resale.

TacosaurusRex said:

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26 Power said:

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Wow, had not heard about this yet. Thanks for sharing the news. I do wonder if they'll continue to support existing customers with warranty and spare parts.

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"We will continue to supply customers and our dealer network service parts and will honour our manufacturer limited warranties, plus offer select programs to manage inventory. These decisions will impact 650 employees globally."

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I saw this too, but no telling how long they actually keep this up. I'm sure moving away from entire outboard production saves them money, but eventually they'll want to get completely out.

Man, my dads current boat and his last boat both had Evinrudes and we've never had any problems. Didn't know they were held is such poor regard

a buddy of mine had one and it was in the shop 5 times (4 months total ) before they ever decided to replace it......to this day they never found what was wrong with it.

So now everyone's gotta run a heavy ass 4 stroke?

I haven't looked but I assume there's still a pretty big gap in weight of a 2 stroke vs 4 stroke?

Gunny456 said:

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This has been coming for a while. The E-Tech technology was a disaster for them. Regardless of what they advertised the failure rate of the engines was really bad. Dealer network has been slowly deteriorating for the last 5-6 years. It really all started when OMC sold off Johnson and E- Rude. Sad as at one time they were great engines.
Their demise was not changing with the demand of the market.
Yamaha basically took over the old OMC market share so now Yamaha and Mercury have the majority of the market share now with Suzuki and Honda getting what they can. Yamaha owns the saltwater market hands down in a global market. Mercury still known for high performance and their presence in freshwater.

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I know you're in the business but I find that surprising because every single person I've known who has run Etecs in the last 10 years or so loves them. And that includes a bunch of saltwater guides.

They've also made some statements that lead me to believe they're coming out with something under the Envinrude badge in the next 18 months or so.

It's better than it used to be but there is still a difference. It does depend on the specific model.

There's a reason I still run my 20 year old Yamaha 3cyl 2stroke. Power to weight is good and it is incredibly reliable.

The smoke signals I've seen from industry insiders is that it's a stern drive.

I have nothing to contribute other than I love my '83 90HP two-stroke. I'm a fan of vintage evinrude.

My Dad had the first fuel injected two stroke Evinrude on his Cajun bay boat when I was growing up. That motor sounded like a formula one engine, but eventually burned up and had to be replaced. Had nothing but good luck with Yamaha motors over the past decade.

Don't take this wrong. I am not challenging you at all. Being in the business as in any, lots of things are shared and discussed often candidly. Most of guys in the business referred to them as E-Wrecks. I had dealers that sold them and would require the customers to sign waivers that they would not sue them when their engines failed.
We packaged our boats with them and they were the least ordered engine of the other two brands.
If they had been that good they would have sold well and they would not be kaput now.
They made a decision years back to try and stay on the 2- stroke path and it simply did not work out.
In regards to the future... management has been let go.... factory reps have been let go..
BRP it seems, is out of the outboard business for good.... time will tell.
I grew up using Evinrude and had the first high performance 3.6 XP V-8 outboard on a boat in our company.....turned a 30" pitch prop right at 7000 RPM and ran 91.6 on a Nordskog speedo. Engine came from OMC's then called " Second Effort" division to answer Mercury's high performance division products. Vintage times for sure and I hate to to see them go but
BRP bad decisions coupled with more bad management of OMC caused their demise.

Yamahas 4-strokes are very similar in weight now than their past two strokes, especially if you figure in oil injection tanks and pumps etc.

Gunny, what are your thoughts on the V8 300R from Mercury? I went with this motor on my boat delivered last November. It's been great so far but I am coming from a Sazuki 250SS that I put 850 hours on with no issues.

Marty ... I think you bought a hoss and a fine engine, but you also previously owned what I think was the best engine Suzuki made. What I have heard is the 300 Merc is following the old
Merc tradition of being one damn good piece of equipment that was born in Mercs HighPerf
division.
I got to experience seeing one on a Bass Cat about three weeks ago and oh my goodness!
Think you did good.
Only thing I have heard is it is a very precision built engine with very tight tolerances and the break in procedure must be followed to a "T".

Marty... I will also say that a friend of mine got one of the first ones out and he put it on his Hanie and loves it so far.

Gunny456 said:

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Don't take this wrong. I am not challenging you at all. Being in the business as in any, lots of things are shared and discussed often candidly. Most of guys in the business referred to them as E-Wrecks. I had dealers that sold them and would require the customers to sign waivers that they would not sue them when their engines failed.
We packaged our boats with them and they were the least ordered engine of the other two brands.
If they had been that good they would have sold well and they would not be kaput now.
They made a decision years back to try and stay on the 2- stroke path and it simply did not work out.
In regards to the future... management has been let go.... factory reps have been let go..
BRP it seems, is out of the outboard business for good.... time will tell.
I grew up using Evinrude and had the first high performance 3.6 XP V-8 outboard on a boat in our company.....turned a 30" pitch prop right at 7000 RPM and ran 91.6 on a Nordskog speedo. Engine came from OMC's then called " Second Effort" division to answer Mercury's high performance division products. Vintage times for sure and I hate to to see them go but
BRP bad decisions coupled with more bad management of OMC caused their demise.

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Might have to do with the size. Everybody I know running them and happy with them is running skiffs with power from a 30hp tiller up to the 115hp remote. I have a 90hp remote on mine and it's great.

The lower hp seems to be the more popular and has a stronger following. Not so much in the 150hp and up.

Tarpon. I agree with you. Most of my business environment deals with 150 hp and up. I would agree that the mid horsepower for them had a decent reputation.
One of my best friends was an OMC tech rep and sadly he died at a young age from cancer.
Good times we had though. I hate to see an old USA brand like that go away....I never liked the fact BRP bought them.

My 17' Whaler was re-powered with a '11 90 HP e-tec. It's been a great motor for that boat combined with a four bladed prop. Took a lot of weight off the stern compared to the old merc that was on it. I've been very happy with it with only routine maintenance. I guess I been lucky (knocking on wood now)!

AggieChemist said:

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The smoke signals I've seen from industry insiders is that it's a stern drive.

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Question for you guys:

If you knew the guy running an E-tec 250 on his bay boat and he has had zero problems, would you buy it?

The boat has a lot of hours on it - not sure how many, but it is only 2 years old. It's currently owned by a guide that we have known for 20 years.

I'm not the buyer but a family member possibly is. Just trying to give him some guidance.

Thanks in advance!

ttha .......I would not take the chance on it.....I believe that BRP/Evinrude had a clause in their warranty that if the engine was used for commercial use .....aka guides...the engine was only warrantied for one year. I have seen a lot of folks in my career purchase marine products that companies have gone out of business and they end up with a "white elephant" they can never get rid of. The % of upper horsepower e-techs in the marketplace is very low compared to others....so resale value was bad even when they were in business........it will decline even worse now.
The guide more than likely got a promotional discount from the boat manufacturer and E-rude to run that product and should not have much in the rig to begin with. Anything has its price....and if it can be picked up cheap enough......( like 50% under blue book)' and low hours (less than 50 or 60).
The other thing I would recommend if your friend is really interested would be to ask if you can take it to a Evinrude dealer and run the computer history data on the engine. That will tell you if the engine was broke in per specs, if it has ever been over revved or overheated, total hours vs. RPM range and if any codes have that may have come up on it. The dealer can also use the serial number to access past service problems and history.
He can also look up when the warranty expires on that particular engine .......to confirm it.
Hope this can help in some way.
Tight lines my friend.

Was hoping you would weigh in! Greatly appreciated. It's my dad looking at the boat so I am probably going to steer him away from it if possible... it's not my money but I will be using the boat, hopefully outside of just Galveston and into POC/Port A/Baffin. I'll update this thread in about two weeks when I'll know more.

I wish they had stopped making E Tec's long ago. Had one, 50 BHP, that all the money in the world could not make run two days in a row. The E Tec was a TOTAL MONEY PIT!!!!