I brought up corrosion several times, got a more or less non telling answer. For the most part they said they have been working on corrosion control and have improved it on their engines. Unofficially, Yamaha and Suzuki both use the same raw aluminum supplier. There was no single answer to the question. I'm seeing an increase in corrosion on all engines. I blame this on regulations in the casting industry. Mercury had the best aluminum but you'll notice they don't advertise the XK360 alloy any more. Since they closed down the Stillwater plant, I'm seeing an increase in corrosion, especially on their lower units. Ive done plenty of exhaust replacements on Yamaha V6's, and the majority of two stroke Yamaha 3 cylinder engines I'm seeing have the head corroded thru, followed closely by the exhaust cavity eating a hole thru. The mid size Yamaha and Merc 4 strokes are Chinese manufactured power heads and I'm seeing corrosion clogging the water passages, but it seems to be more of a design flaw than an alloy issues. I haven't seen enough newer Suzuki's personally to base an opinion on, so I asked some of the other techs. Two of whom are based in Florida and have been selling the newer ones for a while. They said they haven't seen any more corrosion on the Suzukis than any other brand except for Honda(still the worst). Very few Etecs to measure by, so they weren't included.
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