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Mercury V-12 600HP Verado outboard!

Discussion in 'General Yachting Discussion' started by Fishtigua, Feb 11, 2021.

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  1. ChiTown

    ChiTown Member

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  2. Capt Ralph

    Capt Ralph Senior Member

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    Young members.
    Ugh :D:D
    Yes, ad 6 more cylinders to the old Sea drive and you would have a tiller-able Merc-V12.
    Ugh, that was 30(?) years ago? :rolleyes::rolleyes:
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  3. Capt J

    Capt J Senior Member

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    I wouldn't say no issues. I've run 5 different yachts to the yard in the past 2 years that had to have the IPS drives completely rebuilt, either due to water intrusion or exploded gears. All of them were 2014 or newer yachts and under 1000 hours.
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  4. ChiTown

    ChiTown Member

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    I like this young member designation. Carl needs to add this to the "member designations"! Those SeaDrives look like the Envinrude on my neighbors '70's era runabout.
  5. mapism

    mapism Senior Member

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    LOL, and you asked ME in another thread why I don't like IPS?!? :D
  6. Capt J

    Capt J Senior Member

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    I agree they're more maintenance. To Volvo's credit most of these yachts were modern trade in yachts and the service intervals weren't done on time. One had 350 hours since the drive oil was last changed. But I feel the benefits of the better fuel economy easily outweigh the additional expense and the other benefits. But I have seen a lot of issues across all brands. Have a set of 2020 C 18's with 265 hours and both heads are off right now to replace leaking head gaskets (oil) and the oil pan gasket on the starboard is leaking and pan is being dropped to change it. Just looked at a set of 2017 MAN V8-1000's with 620 hours and both raw water pumps are leaking saltwater.
  7. Capt Ralph

    Capt Ralph Senior Member

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    I have to think further back, Yep maybe 40+ years back.
    Afraid I have reduced to many slow brain cells.

    OMC Corp owned Evinrude & Johnson.
    The sea drive was their outboard on a fancy bracket. Worked real well.
    Hydrolic steering and the whole thing tilted way (WAY) up.

    OMC Corp also made a stern (Z, I/O) drive that had some innovation.
    Sadly it involved a big 2 foot hole in their transom.

    Instead of killing themselves with the Ficht injection system, That sea drive idea was (IMO) where they needed to spend more money.
    Think of where they could be now.
  8. mapism

    mapism Senior Member

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    It ain't just a matter of being mode demanding and expensive in terms of maintenance.
    Some recurrent IPS problems like the water ingress that you mentioned are total show stoppers, because unless you don't mind trashing the whole pod, as soon as you see signs of emulsifed oil inside it, VP recommendation is to stop using the boat PDQ, lift it, pull out the pod, flush oil, etc.
    Not what anyone would appreciate out of the blue in the middle of a holiday, I think.
    And also ref. fuel economy, I have several seatrial reports showing clearly that the 30% VP claim was beyond a joke - so much so, that they even stopped advertising it, obviously fearing that someone might call their bluff in a court.
    But let's leave it there. We are way o/t with IPS, and new outboards are also more interesting, imho.

    PS: I agree that also Cat and other engine manufacturers are not anymore as solid as they used to be, anyway. The race to the bottom costwise, together with the constant search of higher power for any given engine size, pretty sure isn't a recipe for improving durability... o_O
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  9. olderboater

    olderboater Senior Member

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    Boats were never and will never be their business. The only reason they bought boat manufacturers was to sell motors.
  10. ChiTown

    ChiTown Member

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    True dat. But they did manage to make some pretty good boats. In the end there is more margin and a more controllable overall business process with engines/drives and in the case of marine outboards and drives little competition with pretty high barriers to entry viv a vis boats.
  11. Capt J

    Capt J Senior Member

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    The problem is. they run the yacht manufacturers they buy into the ground. Can't sell motors, if you stopped selling the yachts you're putting them in!
  12. ChiTown

    ChiTown Member

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    Agreed. It would be like HP building bad printers to sell cartridges. A business school case study would be worth the read. Pure conjecture but it must be an issue of embedded corporate culture where everything revolves around the engine group and the best resources (human, technological and financial) always migrate there. Kind of like MSFT with windows until they finally moved on from Balmer and Gates approach. Anyways my thought was they were positioned well just prior to the Great Recession and the L series “execution “ issues. GMC to Hatteras’ Cadillac or Mercedes. Would be nice to someone become the American Sunseeker, etc
  13. olderboater

    olderboater Senior Member

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    But most of the motors in the larger boats were not theirs. That's why it was so easy to part with Hatteras and then the L Series and the larger Sea Rays and Meridian. No use for boats that don't use their engines.
  14. Capt J

    Capt J Senior Member

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    The 65' Searay used CATS. The 59' L and smaller all used Brunswick engines. All Meridians used Brunswick engines.
  15. olderboater

    olderboater Senior Member

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    The last Meridians I found used Cummins engines and were not Zeus.

    L 550 had CAT.
    Some 460's had Cummins without Zeus.

    Also all those with Zeus had Brunswick drives and Cummins Engines so more dollars not Brunswick than were and the Cummins partnership falling apart as well. Weren't doing a lot to help Mercury Marine.
  16. ranger58sb

    ranger58sb Senior member

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    The 550/58 Sedan Bridge boats had MANs.

    -Chris
  17. gr8trn

    gr8trn Senior Member

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    How can we call one of the most popular drives in the last decade that is still being installed in so many boats way OT and just leave it there after calling it a show stopper?

    I love the idea of big egg beaters hanging of the back too, I get it.

    How can such a show stopper piece of kit, in this case VP IPS, be is so many boats?
    Are that many large boat buyer suckers?
    I wonder what percent of IPS have water intrusion before routine maintenance?
    Granted, when it is your boat and it is pulled for seal replacement for no reason in year two, three or four of ownership, that is not rare.

    I often quote on of my professor who was fond of saying "it ain't rare if it's sittin' in your chair". Referring to exotic eye disease that shows up once in a lifetime at my office. What I try to remember is that despite the odds of something happening, in this case, IPS shenanigans, if it happens to you it is 100%.

    I have never run an IPS, I will never own one. More to do with the forward props and the expense of the power plants they are hooked too, but the water intrusion is another glitch for sure.
  18. Pascal

    Pascal Senior Member

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    Is it the most popular drive system of the last decade? How many boats are being sold with IPS va shafts?

    of all the people who bought new boats in the last 10 years or so, only one picked IPS. And yes... the drive failed for no reason during a trip north and it took three weeks to replace. Why did he pick IPS? Lack of experience and confidence docking
  19. gr8trn

    gr8trn Senior Member

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    I don't know if it is the most popular, I think I wrote one of the most popular. Kinda different. I may be under the wrong impression. Maybe it's just 40-60 foot production boats?
  20. HTMO9

    HTMO9 Senior Member

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    Volvo has sold more than 30.000 IPS systems since starting the program. I would call that an successful product.

    We have 2 IPS boats in the family. My oldest son owns a 77 ft quad IPS and my son in law a 68 ft twin IPS. Both work flawless and always in open sea salt water enviroment. My son son has sheered off one drive on an underwater obstacle. The drive was recovered and repaired and the boat back in the water within a week.

    I myself own a 42 ft tender with twin IPS 600. Also this boat lives most of the time in the cargo bay of my shadow, it works flawless too. We only have to make sure, that the rubber seals remain flexible by greasing them regulary. Other than that no more maintenance than on other drives.

    On this side of the pond VP IPS works pretty well !
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