Time for a New Outboard?
I’ve always been an outboard guy. My earliest memory is being tossed aft in my dad’s Penn Yan runabout when he hit the throttle, ending up face-planted against the sun-warmed red gas tank. My mom hauled me back onto the midships seat, while dad never eased back on the steam by a single rpm. (Not that he knew the rpm. Outboards in those days didn’t have tachs; you adjusted the gas by ear and by feel.) I must have been about 2 years old, but my affection for motors hanging off the transom was already growing.
And what’s better than the smell of exhaust erupting from an old two-stroke on a brisk autumn morning? Makes me think of going with my grandfather to tend his fish traps, an adventure that always started right about sunrise. If somebody bottled the aroma, I’d wear it as cologne. Boating kids today probably don’t know that smell, since new outboards, both two-stroke and four, run cleaner, leave no oily sheen on the water, burn less fuel, hardly ever break down, re- spond to zero-effort digital controls, can steer independently of each other if fitted with a joystick, and generally make excellent shipmates. While old outboards carry the scent of romance, new ones are a heck of a lot better; if your motors are showing their age, maybe it’s time to pry open the treasure chest and
