When Volvo Penta’s sterndrive became an instant success at the January 1959 New York boat show, Mercury came out with their own sterndrive as fast as they could and called it Mercruiser. Improving on Volvo Penta’s design and using non thru hub exhaust boat propellers Mercruiser soon became the dominate leader in sales. Mercury was the second...
Read MoreThe 1960’s. OMC and Mercury continued the competition between themselves as the leaders of the industry. Other outboard motor makers such as Homelite and Scott-Atwater ( McCulloch ) were less popular and sold far less units than the big two. This decade saw fiberglass boats sales explode and wood pleasure boats started to disappear. Mercury...
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When world war II ended in 1945, Mercury was ready with two new motor models. A 3.2 horsepower single cylinder called the Comet and the twin cylinder 6 horsepower named the Rocket. In 1947 the engines were redesigned with a much more modern look and a third model was added called the Lightning. This new model was a higher RPM, 20 cubic inch, 10 horsepower...
Read MoreThe 1940 Mercury outboard boat motor was a very good looking streamlined motor compared to other brands at the time. The drive shaft was put inside a casing that also served to cover the water pickup line and a leak proof under water exhaust system. The water pump was also a huge leap forward in design using a Rotex rubber pump that did not need any...
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