Mercruiser TKS/MPI engines advice

[alrooga]

Anyone had both mpi and tks mercuriser engines offer any insight? I keep finding boats i like but they have tks engines which seems old tech , or is this really a non issue?
Anything to look out for when viewing the boats (pre survey etc). attached pic of one i'm looking at.
Thanks in advance.

 

[julians]

TKS engines use a carburettor to get the fuel into the cylinders (which is quite an old technology as you note ) , whereas MPI uses an electronic fuel injection system.

I think all things being equal I'd prefer the MPI engine, it should be more reliable (ie no messing about getting the carb adjusted, cleaned etc) , and more fuel efficient, but it will depend on the price difference between examples of each as to whether its worth it.

I used to have a boat with a mercruiser 5.0 mpi engine, it was mostly fine, always started fine, ran nicely. Every few years it would need a new idle air control valve - but they werent expensive, and the distributor cap would need replacing every now and again.

 

[spannerman]

As a Mercruiser engineer and long term owner, I would check the service history, the drive shaft bellows need replacing every 5 yrs and the impellor every 3 yrs which is in the drive on an Alpha drive, Bravo drive boats have the seawater pump on the engine so easier to do. I would check the cooling system especially the temps on the risers as they rust and get blocked, any signs of rust around the riser to manifold joint needs investigating as if it leaks internally you risk major engine damage. Not intending to scare you as all marine engines can suffer these problems. My Magnum 350 is 25 yrs old and was still going well when I did a full rebuild last year to up the hp, and now it looks and runs like new even though its a carburettor engine.