to buy or not to buy evinrude please help

[faatman]

Interested in buying a 1997 Evinrude 150 Ficht motor model J150ILEUC, wondering if they are reliable or if i should just stay away. Any responses would be greatly appriciated. Thank you the fatmann

[ccarlson]

I would avoid it personally. Some will say they have the same motor and it is good for them though.

In addition to reading and hearing about problems with this era of this motor, the guy I bought my ranger from had a version of one of these on and it blew a top cylinder. The mechanic said he could fix for $X but in the end he would still have the same motor and he recommended looking at something else for reliability from his experience. So, he put a used Yamaha on it and I bought it from him a couple years later. I would not have bought the boat with the ficht on it and it will affect your resale value/resale-ability as well.

jmho

ccarlson

[mamohr686]

Stay away period. That motor is the early version of the ficht, and the reason OMC went out of business. No factory parts are available for them, besides boat junkyards and online auction websites. Bombadier now owns them and they are a totally different machine. It will spend more time in the shop then on the water. If your looking at a boat and motor combo, you might want to buy it only for the boat and trailer. Plan on re-powering or putting on a different outboard in the near future if you buy it.

[marine_man]

I'd keep looking.

marine_man

[Sonicrunch]

Only buy one of those if you know what you are getting into.

[magnum mike]

Evinrude E-tec - Awesome motor

Evinrude Ficht - Cursed and doomed. I don't know anybody who has a happy story with a Ficht. There will probably be some who has one and never had a lick of trouble. It's like a Remigton 1100 - they made 11 million of them and he is the guy that got one of the 4 that worked...

[Farley]

I did a lot of research before we bought our E-tech and found a lot of people had big big problems with the Ficht motor.

[Valv]

On defense of Evinrude I have to say this: if it's working good now, it's as good as any other motor.

They had many issues in the 1999 to 2003 V6 models, but there has been many, many recalls, revisions, and replacements. This is 12 years after the issues, by now all the problems have been solved and fixed.

As I said above you might want to give another look at it, and knowing the facts you might have some leverage on the sale.

[chubsdemps]

valv need gears for 72 johnson 20 hp castindad charter.net

[goose89]

RUN!! I disagree with the "if it's working now it's okay" sentiment. My father had a 90 Ficht of that era (withing a year or two) and I couldn't believe how trouble free that motor was..........until last year. Funky computer board issue that had to be sent to Alabama I believe.....I couldn't believe it until I researched it. Common issue and place in Alabama is only place to get it fixed. Estimate was 1500-4500. lol...wouldn't know until they had it.