3.0 Mercury with TKS hard starting when sitting for over a week.

[Don S]

Re: 3.0 Mercury with TKS hard starting when sitting for over a week.

It's all kind of funny. Mercruiser trying to use the primer system from an outboard on an IO. They also tried using an outboard charging system on an IO (See 470 manual) which didn't work out very well either.

I really wonder if they will ever learn that IO's and outboards are different. Nah, probably not......

 

[rodbolt]

Re: 3.0 Mercury with TKS hard starting when sitting for over a week.

and whats funny is that yamaha has used it since the late 80,s and it actually works very very well.
if the tech that worked on it actually set it up correctly.
makes one wonder WHY.
WHY have ALL marine engine manufactures spent so much R&D money to make a Turn The KEY starting system.
is pumping the throttle twice,leave the throttle at a position to start the engine at about 1500 RPM and feathering it as the choke unloads that difficult for the general public.
then ya gotta toss in they also have to remember to SUBMERGE the lower or the water pump is toast.

 

[JustJason]

Re: 3.0 Mercury with TKS hard starting when sitting for over a week.

Its funny because if you think about the R&D and the cost in molding a new carb body, and dealing with all the TKS simply does not work as advertised BS. It probably would have been cheaper in the long run to just modify an off the shelf TBI. At least VP didn't screw themselves and offers a TBI for a 3.0L now.
Back to marketing for a second. In the marketing world it all about having a USP (unique selling point) and presenting it in an FAB format (feature, advantage, benefit) (I did sales for years so bear with me)
The sales pitch would go something like this...
Mercury offers TKS on this engine, which VP does not offer (Thats the USP)
FAB time...
Its always "this has, so that, you will... in that order"
This engine has Merc's patented TKS is turn key starting
So that it starts much faster compared to VP's engine
You will have an engine that starts just like a modern day automible.

Problem is... It doesn't work. You can have the best sales pitch in the world... but If it doesn't work then it doesn't work. If it did we wouldn't see TKS posts all the time... (and I wouldn't have to explain to my customers that whats in the owners manual is as I call it "inaccurate info caused by miscommunication between departments") HA... yep that's a lie from me.

If TKS was designed as a standard choke plate replacement/re-design, and wasn't turned into part of the Merc sales pitch, then there would be no issues with the design of it.

Have any of you other tech's had complaints about the "whistle" yet? I get a few each year.


Boat Teck, I got your PM but haven't had a chance to watch it yet. I'm on lousy wireless when i'm at the GF's house and videos don't do so well.