How many hours is too many ?

I have a buddy looking to buy a boat with a 225 hpdi 2004 model with a little under 300 hours on it, he thinks that is way too many hours and the engine is on its last leg, I was thinking that an engine that is properly serviced would last way longer, maybe 1000 hours or more, what can he expect out of this engine ?

if its been taken care of then its got a lot more hours left on it. http://www.bassboatcentral.com/smileys/thumbsup2.gif

Depends on how it was maintained. If done properly, no 300 hours is not many at all. If not done properly you can trash a motor in 50 hours or less.

If your buddy gets the serial number any Yamaha dealer can pull the factory service and recall history out of the computer network. And if he is really concerned and serious about buying that boat, I would offer to the seller to pay for a Yamaha service center to check it over as a final condition of buying the boat. If your buddy pays for the dealer checkout I don't see why the seller would object. Won't hurt to ask and might be money well spent for peace of mind or save him from buying a clunker.

If your buddy will look at that, it is only 50 hours a year (300 HRS DIVIDE BY 6 YEARS) and that is not very many hours at all for a motor that old. If properly cared for that motor will last 1200 hours or more before any major work will have to be done on it. Down south you can figure a guy will put 100 hours a year on a motor. This guy only put 50 on his.

As has been said, it's all about how it's been taken care of. I put 150 hrs on my motor last year, so for me 300 is nothing. Alot of saltwater guys run their motors 1500-2500 hrs.

A properly taken care of engine will last 5000-6000 hours easily.To many hours would be 500 hours a year.Just think about it .... if a guys goes fishing say every weekend all year long and he runs the engine 4 hours per weekend that 52 weeks X 4 hours =208 hours a year.Now if you say no one fishes that much then cut it in half... so a weekend fisherman who puts 1 hour a weekend on his motor for 26 weeks or from March to august.

This hours on the engine thing is just nonsense to me actually.If you were to go buy a used car would you be looking for how many hours are on the car? The answer is no ... you would not be able to swallow if you knew how many hours were on vehicles.My point is hours are not everything and if a motor has warranty on it I would not even be concerned about how many hours are on it.

My .02 cents

Thanks guys, pretty much what I told him.

If you think about it, motor companies when they design a motor, they put THOUSANDS of hours on it in testing to make sure it will last and to find any potential problems. I wouldn't be worried to much about 300 hrs. I'd be more worried as to how well the motor has been taken care of. Has it been serviced regularly, how many times did he overheat it, how many times he has ran it out of oil, ect.

My mechanic told me the weekend fisherman averages 100 hours a year.

100 hours a year in the south 50 in the north. My 05 has just over 300 so if you use the same logic 300 on that motor isn't bad at all.