# Dinghy Motor - Honda? Mercury? Yamaha? Tohatsu?



## Bene505 (Jul 31, 2008)

I was looking at the pricess at Defender and it looks like the Tohatsu is much less expensive than the Yamaha, and the Honda is slightly more expensive. Are they pretty much created equal, or is this another case of getting what you pay for?

Anyone have preferences? Which one did you choose and how has it been for you?


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## T37Chef (Oct 9, 2006)

FWIW...I'm not a big fan of my Honda 2hp 4 stroke. Its loud, it will only start with the freshest of fuel, but is light and easy to handle. I would probably never purchase a Honda outboard or any of their small engines again. Many of the mechanics I have had work on the thing say they're over engineered and see continuous issues with their carburetors.

I used to have a Suzuki 6hp 4 Stroke and was pretty pleased with it but it also liked the freshest of fuel.

How I miss the days of the Briggs & Straton that would start after sitting all winter on the first pull 

Bottom line, I don't like the new generation of small 4 stroke outboard engines, next one will be a two stroke.

My boat neighbor is very happy with his 4 year old Tahatsu though


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## CaptainForce (Jan 1, 2006)

I've had a Honda 4-stroke 5hp for the last two years after my long-lived Yamaha 2-stroke finally became unreliable. For me it's been an easy starting, no problem, reliable engine,- no sensitive fuel issues. 'take care and joy, Aythya crew


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

I have the Tohatsu 3.5 HP... It's been a solid little engine. Be aware that the small (under 10 HP IIRC) Nissan, Mercury and Tohatsu outboards are actually all made by Tohatsu.


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## T37Chef (Oct 9, 2006)

"Be aware"???


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## rats319 (Sep 19, 2007)

I just recently bought a mercury 8 hp 4 stroke, and so far i am very pleased with it. Starts easy and runs very quiet. I went with mercury after my previous merc lasted well over 20 years. I really like the fact that you can shift the gears from the control tiller without having to lean down to reach the motor.


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## NCountry (May 25, 2006)

I've had a 2.5 Mercury 2 stroke for about 4 years now. It's pretty basic mechanicaly and has done a great job of pushing around my water tender 9.4, mixing the gas and oil is a little bit of a pain but the elimination of some service issues due to it being a 2 stroke is nice. It is also light and easy to carry around. When it come time to put it up I just run the fuel out of it and store it for the winter. Don't know how it would handle the salt but it does great in fresh water.


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## jorgenl (Aug 14, 2006)

I've got a Honda 20 hp. Love it. Super quiet and relatively light for it's size. Dinghy planes with 4 adults.


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## sailingfool (Apr 17, 2000)

I've had seven years of excellent service from a Tohatsu 8HP two cycle, it has always started on the first pull and seems quite solid. probably good for anothe seven years of faultless operation. IMHO buy a used two cycle if you can find a good one, less weight, more power.


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## tommays (Sep 9, 2008)

All the current 4strokes have about 0 tolerance for sitting around any amount of time with fuel left in the carb

The Tohatsu's have a rubber plug right in the motor cover that allows you to drain the carb on to a paper towel


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## SVlagniappe (Jun 22, 2008)

I bought a 9.9 HP Honda last fall and have been happy with it so far. However, there was a surprise in the owner's manual. It says you must flush with fresh water after every use in saltwater. Quite an inconvenience here at the dock. Can't imagine complying with that while cruising...


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## mrwuffles (Sep 9, 2008)

we have an old 8hp honda 4 stroke and it runs like a charm no problems with sitting and starts up every it is so quiet that when you are at the bow of my 14 foot boat the only reason you know it is running is a slight vibration


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

Yup... when you need service for it and can't find a Tohatsu dealer, you can often get the parts you need at the local mercury or Nissan dealer, as my friend down in the Caribbean learned...after I told her they were all the same engine. 


T37Chef said:


> "Be aware"???


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## KindOfBlue (Nov 22, 2005)

My 5HP Tohatsu is lighter and faster than my Honda 5HP. The Tohatsu cost much less and is no more or less reliable. Both suffer from ethanol problems equally. If you don't know how to clean a carb, I suggest that you watch a couple of YouTube videos on small engine carb cleaning so that you know what to do when it happens to you.


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## jrd22 (Nov 14, 2000)

I've had a couple of Nissan/Tohatsu 9.8 hp two strokes that have been absolutely bullet proof. Love them. Just bought a new Yamaha 4hp four stroke and it's loud and has quite a bit of vibration at low RPM, which is understandable being single cylinder. I'd go with Tohatsu if I were you, less money, great engines.


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## timebandit (Sep 18, 2002)

You might try mixing two stroke oil in you four stroke gas at about 100 to 1. I found this seems keep the gas from going bad and does not hurt the performance of my lawnmower or make it smoke. I foun this out by using up my two stroke gas from the boat.



KindOfBlue said:


> My 5HP Tohatsu is lighter and faster than my Honda 5HP. The Tohatsu cost much less and is no more or less reliable. Both suffer from ethanol problems equally. If you don't know how to clean a carb, I suggest that you watch a couple of YouTube videos on small engine carb cleaning so that you know what to do when it happens to you.


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## jfdubu (Jul 18, 2002)

My 2 cents, I would buy a yamaha. period.
I have a 2 stroke 3hp yami on my tender that I've had for 6 years and the motor was given to me. I think it's over 10 years old.

I have done nothing to this motor. nada , zilch. execpt run fresh water throught it for the winter. In six years it's three or four pulls when I pull it out of the basement to start the year and one pull after that all season. I don't change the gas, havn't changed the plug, nothing.

This motor is the most dependable part of my boat toys. When (and if) it ever dies it will be replaced with a yamaha.

A friend has a 5 hp 4 stroke honda and it's a PITA to run and it's heavy.

John


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## lancelot9898 (Dec 30, 2008)

In 1993 I bought a 5hp 2 stroke Nissan outboard and it still starts easily and runs good with very minimal maintenance. In fact I have not even changed spark plugs on it in all those years. I forget the weight, but still light enough to lift into the dingy without use of halyards etc. It will plane the wood floor Archilles with me(205 lbs) and my girlfriend(130 lbs) which is important if you want to go any distance to explore. The one negative is that some of the metal is not first rate....I've sheared off a bolt head on the flushing port and the zinc bolt. I do like the 4 stoke engines since fuel economy is better, but until their weight gets reduced I'm sticking with the old Nissan.


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## jjns (Jul 8, 2007)

We bought a new 2HP honda, used it once and traded it in on a 2.5HP Yamaha.
The honda was light, that is about all the good I can say of it. The Yamaha has been fantastic though heavy (honda was about 24lbs, Yamy is more like 34lbs) 
it is water cooled, gets great gas mileage. It has been in storage for 3 years now, pulled it out last week, filled the tank and it started up on a 1/2 pull.
Has lots of power will run for an hour an a litre of gas. So with a full tank and a 1gal jerry can (the no spill variety work great) I can motor for 5 hrs.


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## BeneteauMark (Nov 7, 2002)

I've owned OB's from Tohatsu, Nissan, Mercury and Yamaha. 

Our current dingy OB is a Yamaha two stoke 8 hp. (Yamaha still offers two strokes, if you can find them.) Easy starting, light for its horsepower and lots of power. Wonderful OB -- no issues at all.

We also have a four stroke Yamaha on the sailboat. Great power, but finicky about fuel. Had to have it worked on about every other year for hard starting. Am currently disconnecting the fuel hose at shutdown and let her run out of gas per dealer's suggestion. Also, am running the cleaning dose of Sea Foam all the time (2 oz per gallon). Will see how this regimen goes over time. (FWIW, besides stabilizing fuel, Sea Foam is supposed to perform the same combustion chamber cleaning as Yamaha's Ring Free.)

Prior to that, I had a Mercury four stroke on the sailboat, and wasn't happy with it at all. Initial unit was a bonafide lemon with massive starting issues the dealer couldn't fix. Mercury was no help at all, and the dealer finally replaced it after some arm twisting. Mercury #2 started OK, but was light on power. It was marginal even with a high thrust prop.

Many moons ago, I had a Tohatsu OB, but it was hard to get serviced in SE Michigan. The Nissan dealers wouldn't touch it, even though it was mechanically identical to a Nissan. 

At this same time I had a little 3.5 hp Nissan for my dingy, and it was a wonderful little OB. Easy starting and no real issues.

Hope this helps.
Mark


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

Unlike some, I've had a good experience with my Honda 2 HP air-cooled 4-stroke. Yes, they are noisy, and yes, my 110 lb. wife can one-arm it out of a forepeak hatch.

We ran ours for the first time this year with a fully loaded Portabote into 1.5-2 foot waves (much of which was prop wash from over-eager powerboaters. It ran perfectly and drove us at 4 knots.

I have no need to go faster than that in a Portabote.

The only criticism is that it has only about a hour of runtime in any kind of a sea. On the other hand, you can refuel from a ketchup squeeze bottle...

While I would consider a Nissan or other water-cooled 4 stroke, the air-cooled aspect and the very light weight make it appropriate for passagemaking use in that there's not a lot of "fun" trips in a tender (we have a nesting, sailing dinghy for that), and it's more about one person taking the Portabote to shore to grab a couple of jugs of fuel or a case of provisions. Two measly horses is enough for that, and I have "motor rowed" the Portabote to beyond that.

Yeah, I got laughed at, but I wanted to see if I could row at five knots. The answer is "yes".


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## chef2sail (Nov 27, 2007)

We have had a 4 HP Tahatsu (Nissan) for the last two years and it has been flawless. It has great power and is low maintenance and starts on the first pull. We got the 4 hp for the versatility of being able to add an external tank so we would have to refill every hour of usage

I would buy another one.


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

Yes, I might be interested in an after-market fitting that allowed even a three-gallon tank on my little Honda, I suppose, but that would increase my range to several hours!

As I said, if you fill up from an old thermos, it's not so bad.


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## Joel73 (Apr 23, 2007)

A very simular thread here that might have some answers for future readers of this thread: http://www.sailnet.com/forums/gear-maintenance/40738-new-dink-looking-tohatsu-3-5-a.html

We ended up going with the Tohatsu 3.5 4 stroke after much research... it should arrive today and i'll report back with our experiences with it over the summer after we put it to good use.


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## Bene505 (Jul 31, 2008)

Bene505 said:


> I was looking at the pricess at Defender and it looks like the Tohatsu is much less expensive than the Yamaha, and the Honda is slightly more expensive. Are they pretty much created equal, or is this another case of getting what you pay for?
> 
> Anyone have preferences? Which one did you choose and how has it been for you?


Circling back on this, we chose a 11'6" Achilles RIB with a 20hp Tohatsu.

We actually sailed to within 2 miles of Defender and took a taxi to their store. We paid someone $50 to put the dinghy and engine in the back of his pickup to take it the 2 miles back to the shore. And then after unwrapping and inflating and installing and putting oil and gas in, we paid somone else with a pickup $20 to take the garbage away. I made multiple trips to get everyone to our sailboat, because we had a limited number of life vests with us. That was ok, since I needed to follow the break-in procedure of running at X% power for Y minutes. The trips back and forth gave me the chance to do the early break in steps well.

1) We needed the hard bottom becuase we always are dragging her up onto the beach over rocks, shells etc. Unless you are pulling up to mud or a dinghy dock all the time, I can't imaging having a soft bottom, unless weight and storage space are a problem.

2) We needed a boat that would hold all 6 of us. That was important to me -- no going back to get the other people left on shore. With little kids, to do otherwise would be chosing from less than desirable options of which kids to leave on shore, espcially when perhaps I'm away for the day, or the older ones aren't there. If memory serves, it has over 1600 pounds of useful load on the plackard. Even as my kids grow, I'll still be able to take all of us.

3) The 20 hp Tohatsu is the same engine as their 15 hp, only with a different carburator. For a difference of $300, we get 25% more hp. Turns out it's needed to get our crew up on plane. In Martha's Vineyard, we took the dinghy to a beach 3 miles from the boat and planed almost the whole way there. And that was with coolers, beach chairs, etc. We've also done a little tubing behind the dinghy - lots of fun.

Total cost was pretty high, but cheap due to Defender's sale. (They gave it to us at sales price even though we were a few days early.) I consider this a long term investment. Defender charged me sales tax which they say they will refund after I send them the proper form -- they will refund it because I bought the boat and engine together ans so . Registering in NY state, they only charged me sales tax on the boat, not the engine. When buying a dinghy and engine, make sure the receipt breaks out the two costs, so the state can charge you tax on only the engine.

I did pull it up onto our davits once, so it works. Of course, I had the engine off. That probably is the only downside, with that size dinghy and engine combination you need to take the engine off for trips, at leas twith my davits/ A 117 pounds, the engine is a little heavy, but by using one davit as a hoist I got it onto our swim platform and then from there it was simple lift of a few inches to get it onto the engine storage board that's mounted on the rails.

All in all, I'm very happy with the purchase, even if it emptied my wallet a bunch -- long term investment, long term investment (keep saying it to yourself). The utility of having a dinghy is so far superior to the old method of using our kayak and an old windsurf board to move people and supplies aboard. And that's not even mentioning the grandparents and other elderly friends, who really couldn't visit without our first going to a dock.

Finally, my son and I took our dinghy surfing. We put the surfboards in and I dropped him off at a couple breaks along the coast. I didn't feel comfortable leaving the dinghy at anchor in deep water or pulling it up onto shore with the wave conditions, so I didn't surf that time.

All in all, it's great to have a good dinghy. Thanks for all the help and feedback on what to buy

Regards,
Brad


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## CaptKermie (Nov 24, 2006)

Where are people finding those old two strokes??? Especially the Nissan 9.8 two stroke, I'd love to get my hands on one. I currently use a Honda 5hp 4 stroke and it has not failed me in several years, good little engine but it is just slightly underpowered, I think a 6, 8, or 9.8 would be better but the big limitation is weight. I will not exceed 60# because that is about the most I can lug on and off the dinghy. The 9.8 Nissan 2 stroke comes in at about that weight and would really make my little dinghy rock. For me everything has to be luggable, dinghy included and it is 78# 9'9".


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## Bene505 (Jul 31, 2008)

CaptKermie said:


> Where are people finding those old two strokes??? Especially the Nissan 9.8 two stroke, I'd love to get my hands on one. I currently use a Honda 5hp 4 stroke and it has not failed me in several years, good little engine but it is just slightly underpowered, I think a 6, 8, or 9.8 would be better but the big limitation is weight. I will not exceed 60# because that is about the most I can lug on and off the dinghy. The 9.8 Nissan 2 stroke comes in at about that weight and would really make my little dinghy rock. For me everything has to be luggable, dinghy included and it is 78# 9'9".


I'd try eBay and caigslist. On eBay, try this search:

(yahama,nissan,honda) (9.9,5,8)

Or something like that.

Regards,
Brad


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