The snow is melting and the weather is warming up. Mercury is running a warranty promotion through the middle of April that grants extra warranty on new outboard purchases. You dream of taking the family water skiing and tubing or hitting up the local lake for some prime fishing. You take advantage of the warranty promotion and pick out a new boat with a Mercury engine and are excited to take delivery so you can get out on the water ASAP.

You toss your owner’s manual into the boat and head to the lake. You back the boat into the water, crank the engine, and get ready to….run the engine up to ¾ throttle for an hour?! How can that be fun? What’s the point? You wouldn’t buy a new red sports car to cruise the suburbs at 25 mph, right? Well, you might be surprised to learn that the first four to ten hours of run time on your engine may very well be the most important hours you put on it.

Engine break-in is performed to manipulate certain surfaces within the engine. Even with current machining processes, there may still be some irregularities on machined and honed surfaces. The break-in process allows the engine to wear down the high spots of these irregularities, providing a smoother surface before the engine experiences the rigors of normal use. The main areas of break-in focus are the cylinder walls, cam lobes, clutch engagement surfaces, and gear engagement surfaces. Engine break-in also helps seat the piston rings and helps to maintain tighter tolerances and better lubrication of moving parts, prolonging engine life.

Break-in procedures vary from engine to engine. For instance, the break-in on a FourStroke is different than that of an OptiMax. It is very important to read the owner’s manual and follow the break-in procedure as directed. It’s understandable that cruising across the lake for four or five hours when you’d rather be fishing or tearing up the water on skis is an inconvenience, but it’s an inconvenience that will reap rewards in the way of years of enjoyable boating!