I am well aware that fichts are ticking time bombs. What 16 year old motor is not?
Would you own a pair with 600hrs that were on a boat already? Like the hull, hate the motors and trying to give as little value with the long in the tooth power plants as possible. Supposedly had emm/ecm replaced, one at 2 years ago the other at 4.
Would like to try and get a couple years out of them if I purchased the boat while saving for the repower. Bad plan?
I’m pretty sure I know the answer, wondering what other opinions were.
If it were me, with what you’ve said, I’d forget about this one. You already stated you “hate” the motors, Your thought is that the motors are not reliable, we all know the resale value on these motors comparable to junk prices.
Here’s my experience…
3 years ago I bought a boat where I had fell in love with the hull, but knew the boat was underpowered. I didn’t “hate” the motor and knew it would be an easy resale with a respectable price.( recent model Yamaha low hour, F150 w/controls & prop) Still, i bought the boat knowing a repower was coming. Boat got the new motor, old motor got resold and everyone is happy. If I couldn’t have recouped my money from the old motor I wouldn’t have been happy at all.
It’s nearly impossible to resell two stroke motors unless they are Yamaha.
I went through that with my mercury. I gave no value to the motor when I bought the boat, then I repowered a couple years later. The boat dealer had a really hard timing moving that old motor. They sold it to a dealer in texas for half the book value, even with the rigging and prop.
I wouldn’t offer him more than what you would pay for the hull and trailer. I’m sure the seller knows that nobody wants those motors.
If you’re financing it might be a pain to swap motors, depending on your bank.
I HAD A PAIR OF 2006 115’S AND THEY WERE AWESOME, BUT I ONLY KEPT THEM 2 SEASONS AND SOLD THE BOAT, BUT I WOULD OWN ANOTHER PAIR.
NOT SO SURE ABOUT THE 2000 MODELS, THAT WAS EARLY ON WHEN THEY WERE HAVING MAJOR ISSUES.
THAT BEING SAID, 16 YEARS AND 600 HOURS, SEEMS LIKE THEY ARE HOLDING THEIR OWN.
JUST MAKE SURE YOU BUY IT AT TEH RIGHT PRICE, BECAUSE THOSE MOTOR DONT HAVE MUCH IN RESALE VALUE
Chris, can parts even be purchased for the 2000 fichts?
If I bought it I would cross my fingers to get 2 years out of it to save for a repower.
do they typically blow early if it’s got problems. Obviously 16 year olds are on borrowed time.
Sucks trying to boat on a budget.
Im always reading on here about older 2 stroke outboards. Now my thing is if the motor or motors are ran and maintained like they are supposed to why is everyome scared of a 2 stroke thats ten years old. I have a 30 year old mercury on my flats boat that has well over 5000 hrs on it and I still run it 4 days out the week and yes ive taken my 16ft boat with a 2 stroke 25 all the way out to the nearshore reefs and shut it off while im out there. What really funny is I have another boat with a 115 4 stroke mercury on it that has. Less than 100 hrs on Iit and Iim scared to shut it off when I run offshore due to the fact it had a bad ground wire from the factory and it left me ofshore and wouldnt crank back up. Anyways just my two cents.
They’re 16 year old FITCH motors, not to be confused with 10 year old carb. mercurys and yamahas.
Read up on these motors and it’ll be a little clearer.
These things were the “Ford Granada” of the outboard world.
I only knew of a couple guys that ran them on bass boats. They were constantly in the shop. Couldn’t get squat for trade value when they finally had enough. My cousin had one. He finally had some upgrades done and the motor was somewhat reliable after that, but getting to that point was a nightmare.