Nissan-Tohatsu 4 Stroke Outboards Reliability and Longevity

[scjakester]

Hello all. I feel like I'm starting to get to know some of you guys. I'm glad I found this forum, it's been great. A little background, I am truly a Honda fanatic (my pickup truck, my lawn mowers, generator, ATV, pressure washer, weed whacker, etc. are all Honda powered products. I have never had a bad experience with a Honda product and I guess I really trust them.

On the other hand, my boating experience has not been so good. I have owned several boats over the years. They've been powered by Johnson, Mercury, & Suzuki, all 2 stroke technology and I've never owned an engine that I could honestly say I trusted... or even liked, or well... didn't hate to be honest. I've never owned one that if a friend came to me saying they were looking to purchase a new outboard that I could look them in the eye and say, "Hey Bill, you might want to at least consider _______." ....my last 2 boats added financial injury to customer insult. They were both in the 7-10 year old range at the time, and I went through three different 2-stroke engines over a 3 year period with them. Two blown Mercury 150 outboards (it was actually the same outboard, but I had it professionally reman'd so I'm counting it as 2) and a Suzuki with lots and lots of lots of electrical problems. The Suzuki spent 5 solid months (not an exaggeration) going between dealers in Charleston, SC and Jacksonville, FL in a finger pointing game of who was going to have to have to eat the service fees. (Longer story than I care to type, but thank God for warranties). I cannot count the times I had to row those damn boats back to the dock or sit out there and wait for a tow. It was as far from my Honda experiences as you could possibly get -- it was truly TERRIBLE. In fact, I swore off boating forever when I basically gave the last one away. But with time, proper medication and adequate therapy, here I am, a testament to the recovery process.

Anyway, I just couldn't find the boat I wanted (a small Carolina Skiff) powered with a Honda Marine Outboard. At least not one that I could afford, I ran several by the "Finance Committee" but she met them with immediate rejection. Ha! The Skiff I purchased has a used 2002 4 Stroke Nissan-Tohatsu NSF25A. It is a carbureted elec start tiller jobbie. So far out of the 3 weeks I've owned it, one week was spent sitting inoperable at the top of my boat ramp, and the other two weeks have been spent in the shop getting the carburators rebuilt. Pretty much inline with my last couple of boating experiences. :facepalm:


I said that so I can ask this; from you folks that have experience with the Nissan-Tohatsu line of outboards, are y'all pretty happy with them? How do the Nissan-Tohatsu engines compare in reliability and longevity to the Honda Marine 4-stroke outboard products? I keep up with engine maintenance, I don't abuse my stuff, and I don't care about setting any speed records. I just want a nice long series of consecutive and uneventful fishing trips. Should I be worried?

-Jake A.
Lake Murray
South Carolina

 

[TOHATSU GURU]

Re: Nissan-Tohatsu 4 Stroke Outboards Reliability and Longevity

They are as good as anything else on the market. It's really more about what you feel about a brand name than any concrete negatives about one brand or another.

 

[dtj]

Re: Nissan-Tohatsu 4 Stroke Outboards Reliability and Longevity

Since you are a Honda fan, I am surprised you have not already gone the Honda route to improve reliability.

I personally believe Honda engine products are as good as or better than all others on the market..................but are overpriced relative to their superior engineered and manufactured product.

If reliability is your number one priority and price is no objective, then go Honda.........but if value is a factor, then you are going to have to make some compromising decisions.

Honda and Tohatsu engine owner.............Don in Redondo

 

[WN2712NJ]

Re: Nissan-Tohatsu 4 Stroke Outboards Reliability and Longevity

Boy if I were you I would be thinking of another hobby - like standing in a shower tearing up $50 bills ;-).

We had a boat for a few years in the 70s when I was a child. My main memories of it were:
1. Scrapping and painting the wooden hull.
2. My dad tinkering with the 60's vintage OMC motor on it, alternating with having to paddle us home (and this was a 17 foot cruiser, not a row boat).

Fast forward to the new millenium, and a few years ago we bought a 14 foot skiff with a 9.9HP Merc (same powerhead as Nissan/Tohatsu) 4 st that was only a couple of years old. In two years and perhaps 50 hours of operation we had two occasions where we had to row. The first was when one (not loctited) screw fell out out of the tiller arm, rendering the entire gear shift/throttle assembly inop (this is a Merc specific feature which I will NEVER own again). The second was apparently caused by the carb jets becoming clogged.

The boat was underpowered with the 9.9 and after the second experience with rowing a distance I decided to spring for a new Tohatsu 20HP 4st before my teenswent out and ended up stranded in the skiff. This motor has never left us stranded (2 years now) but it did have a major warranty repair due to a oil leak in the powerhead. Tohatsu replaced the whole powerhead under warranty (thanks partially to Tohatsu Guru).

So my experience is you just don't get the level of day to day reliability out of a marine engine that you get from a car. Given the harsher operating environment, the fact that marine engines are run at high power, and (for most of us) infrequent use I guess I'm not surprised.

I would say that for a 9 year old motor having to have a tune-up once is not a bad thing. If you end up having repeated carb issues, you either have a lemon or fuel quality issues. If you read these forums, you'll see fuel quality (or lack thereof) is on the top of everyone's radar these days. Consider using Stabil, and installing an inline fuel filter/water separator.

If reliability is really important (e.g. no power is a safety issue where you boat) then I think the only real solution is to have multiple power sources, even in a small boat. And multiple fuel tanks, for that matter. A 2-3 HP "kicker" motor might do the trick.

 

[TOHATSU GURU]

Re: Nissan-Tohatsu 4 Stroke Outboards Reliability and Longevity

You know Mercury actually offers a kit to go back to the orginal Tohatsu shift design to get away from that flighty throttle/shift feature

 

[WN2712NJ]

Re: Nissan-Tohatsu 4 Stroke Outboards Reliability and Longevity

You know Mercury actually offers a kit to go back to the orginal Tohatsu shift design to get away from that flighty throttle/shift feature

I actually still have the 9.9 and am hoping to sell it to someone who likes that arrangement. My neighbor has one and claims it is great for fishing on the river where they are constantly shifting to try to hold position over a hole. My daughter slammed the skiff pretty hard into the dock one time when she got confused by it. It's definitely not a good feature in my book.

-dm

 

[pvanv]

Re: Nissan-Tohatsu 4 Stroke Outboards Reliability and Longevity

There really aren't any bad OB motors these days -- they are all tons better than what we had decades ago. Better metallurgy and closer machining tolerances, vastly better lubricants, coupled with improved ignition systems, translates into better motors. Lower maintenance, higher reliability, etc. Some of those early '70's motors (of any brand) were what gave OB's a bad name for reliability. A lot of us old timers still have sore right shoulders from pulling and pulling on those recoils.

That said, Honda is the most expensive product line, while Tohatsu (/Nissan/Merc) is the least expensive. The Tohatsu motors were originally conceived for use in commercial and offshore fishing, so they tend to stay on the conservative, high-reliability side of the engineering curve. In other words, reliability is their company mantra. Bang for the buck, Tohatsu is the best value in OB's today.

The 3-cylinder 4-stroke Tohatsu 25/30 in particular, is very smooth, running a lot like a car engine. Especially with electric start, many of my customers compare their operation to driving a car. The newer B models have fuel injection, and are even nicer. The only real issue with your A model would be the same as for any carbureted OB of any brand: Fuel quality and cleanliness. Always run fresh fuel -- not over 30 days old. Always run the carbs dry at the end of the day. Run a water-separating fuel filter. Consider adding a good fuel stabilizer in every tank of gas, just in case some fuel accidentally sits for a while.