Single Engine or Twin Engine ?

People like twin engines on boats because they can’t pull over to a service station if one quits. That’s a big reason for having two motors, particularly on offshore boats. However, the excess factor has to be weighed against a lot of other factors when you decide whether to have one engine or two. The most obvious factor is cost. Outboard motors are outrageously expensive, averaging from $10,000 to $20,000 for a V6 of 150 to 225 horsepower. Buying two motors instead of one can add 30 percent to the price of a boat.

Maintenance of powerboat fuel system

One of the important reason why we have to do maintenance on our boat is impact of the fuel used. The advent of E10 gasoline (gas with 10 percent ethanol) has caused major problems for boaters. The fuel dissolves some fiberglass fuel tanks and can attack hoses and seals on older boats. The stuff that it dissolves may end up clogging your carburetor or injectors. The fuel itself deteriorates much faster, too, because it can attract fifty times more water vapor from the atmosphere than conventional gasoline. When too much water is absorbed, a phenomenon called phase separation occurs, in which the water and ethanol drop to the bottom of the tank and the gas floats to the top, losing about three points of octane in the process.

Acquainted to Outboard Motors

The first engines most boaters use are outboard motors. Outboards are engines featuring an integral drive system including a drive shaft and propeller, all in a single unit that can be moved from boat to boat. All of them still look more or less like the motor designed by Wisconsin inventor Ole Evinrude and patented in the United States on September 16, 1910. Evinrude went on to found Outboard Marine Corporation (OMC), one of the world’s largest manufacturers of outboards.