What is wrong with Mercury?

**JR IN JAX** · 08-10-2021, 06:50 PM

When my 1 1/2 year old Hill Drag 5 cracked a blade back on June 19 and I ordered a new 31.5 Pro Max that was supposed to ship in 2 days. The Date then changed from 6/19 to 7/1 and then to 7/19, then 8/9 and now 8/31. Is Merc Racing having to get someone to swim to China and pick up my prop?

Can Merc Racing be trusted to have my prop to me on 8/31 or should I have someone build a custom prop again.

Please advise.....

**mercace** · 08-10-2021, 07:24 PM

Shortage of resin that they use in the slurry to coat the wax castings.

**LaveyT** · 08-10-2021, 07:47 PM

Originally Posted by mercace

Shortage of resin that they use in the slurry to coat the wax castings.

A friend cannot even get a projected delivery date on some fiberglass insulating tube for his products. Its costing him a bunch of missed sales. The company says its because of a Resin shortage (China is the main supplier)(for this particular company)

**25two.stroke** · 08-10-2021, 07:49 PM

And shortage of source metals probably even though merc mixes their own concoctions here...
All dealers were warned about a shortage of stainless props 2 years ago...its nothing new.

Mercury availability predictions are never accurate and should not be treated as such. When I order parts for someone and Merc says they are not available till _______ I automatically add a month or more. New motors add 3 months, sometimes 6. All parts a month. Mercury was out of stock on upper motor mount bolts for a 280 and fat tube water pump housings...they changed the availability 4 times before I finally got the parts 3 months after the original estimated availability.

Bottom line, if merc doesn't have it and you can get it somewhere else then do so. Merc will not come through on backordered stuff.

**powerabout** · 08-11-2021, 12:15 AM

JIT supply line, instantly goes wrong when one link in the chain hiccups
How is the Jap stuff doing?

**TooStroked** · 08-11-2021, 07:00 AM

Originally Posted by powerabout

JIT supply line, instantly goes wrong when one link in the chain hiccups
How is the Jap stuff doing?

I find it interesting how many self proclaimed "supply chain experts" on the internet blame Just in Time (JIT) practices for everything that's wrong with supply chains these days. Virtually every one of these folks also proposes that if we went back to the "good old days" of warehouses filled with inventory, none of these problems would exist. They conveniently forget how many of the parts in those warehouses were defective, lost, out of date or just plain the wrong parts. Oh, and they cost a bloody fortune for all of those reasons and more. Trust me, I spent 36 years in manufacturing and I've been there, done that and got the t-shirt.

The truth is that today's world is truly a global economy and nobody can survive without everybody else. There are some products that can only be sourced in one or two places in the whole world. The bigger problem is companies seeking short term gains by sourcing everything in China. The US has done a stellar job of chasing business there by making US based manufacturing more and more (and about to get way more) expensive. An unexpected - and hopefully once in a lifetime - problem showed everybody the weaknesses of a global economy. This is not a simple problem and there is no simple solution.

**XstreamVking** · 08-11-2021, 07:37 AM

Solution, bring all critical major mfg back to the continental US. If you are a US company, all parts must be made in the US. Not 20% or 60 %. but 100%. We could do it if we wanted. Stuff coming in would have a giant tariff. Wait, wasn't this the previous admin's plan? Yes it was, now we know why. Say it out loud, china is out to wreck our production capability and steals everything they can product development wise.

**David** · 08-11-2021, 07:41 AM

Toyota has lost less production due to shortages then the other big OEMs and they might be the best at JIT. What I know for sure is that if the OEMs had not lost a lot of production due to the chip shortage, companies like my employer would have shut them down due to steel and resin shortages. It’s very hard to get supplies.

If I needed a prop I would buy off the shelf (if anyone had one) or used. Getting one made is likely to take time. As it turns out I have a prop habit and have a bunch more then I need.

**boostalmighty** · 08-11-2021, 07:47 AM

Originally Posted by XstreamVking

Solution, bring all critical major mfg back to the continental US. If you are a US company, all parts must be made in the US. Not 20% or 60 %. but 100%. We could do it if we wanted. Stuff coming in would have a giant tariff. Wait, wasn't this the previous admin's plan? Yes it was, now we know why. Say it out loud, china is out to wreck our production capability and steals everything they can product development wise.

I agree with this entire statement, we need to become a nation of producers again. fill our metaphorical glass and stop trying to fill the world's glasses.

**XstreamVking** · 08-11-2021, 07:48 AM

We will all be like the Cubans living in Cuba after a while. Can't buy it? Make it locally or buy used and refurbish it. The govt is making another "crisis" out of our supply chain. I'm convinced they are going to crash our economy on purpose. The 5 trillion spending bill just approved is valid proof of it.

**powerabout** · 08-11-2021, 08:44 AM

Originally Posted by TooStroked

I find it interesting how many self proclaimed "supply chain experts" on the internet blame Just in Time (JIT) practices for everything that's wrong with supply chains these days. Virtually every one of these folks also proposes that if we went back to the "good old days" of warehouses filled with inventory, none of these problems would exist. They conveniently forget how many of the parts in those warehouses were defective, lost, out of date or just plain the wrong parts. Oh, and they cost a bloody fortune for all of those reasons and more. Trust me, I spent 36 years in manufacturing and I've been there, done that and got the t-shirt.

The truth is that today's world is truly a global economy and nobody can survive without everybody else. There are some products that can only be sourced in one or two places in the whole world. The bigger problem is companies seeking short term gains by sourcing everything in China. The US has done a stellar job of chasing business there by making US based manufacturing more and more (and about to get way more) expensive. An unexpected - and hopefully once in a lifetime - problem showed everybody the weaknesses of a global economy. This is not a simple problem and there is no simple solution.

The supply chain has failed, where's the problem?
Shipping doing bigger volume than it has for decades, what are they shipping?

**Chaz** · 08-11-2021, 08:45 AM

Originally Posted by SS Minnow

You should ask @Chaz what is wrong with Mercury. He might have something to say.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words .

In short , here was the solution to most of our problems ...

**Dave S** · 08-11-2021, 09:13 AM

Why ask Chazz......go to the guys that KNOW.........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rO-ttUAiVDw

**TooStroked** · 08-11-2021, 09:34 AM

Originally Posted by powerabout

The supply chain has failed, where's the problem?
Shipping doing bigger volume than it has for decades, what are they shipping?

You are correct in that supply chains have failed. What you fail to mention is why they failed. To partially answer that question, let's go to New Orleans - an entire city built well below sea level. How did they do that? A complicated (and expensive) system of dikes, levees, dams and pumps designed to keep everything dry. But when you design a system like that, what level of natural disaster do you design it for? Do you design it for storms that happen every week, every year, every 100 years? The reason that's important is that designing the system to withstand a storm that happens only every 100 years is much more expensive than for one that happens every week.

Because nobody could afford to build a system that withstood anything that could happen, when Katrina hit, New Orleans flooded - and the engineers that designed the system were not surprised. It was literally a once in 100 years situation.

Back to supply chains failing. What caused the failure(s)? COVID 19 shut down assembly lines, factories and even whole countries. The first link in the chain broke, then each succeeding link failed in pretty short order. "But if we had tons of inventory we wouldn't have this problem" some say. As I've previously stated, that wouldn't have worked either. COVID is to supply chains (and many other things) the 100 year storm.

As to your question "What are they shipping?" good question. Lot's of supply chain rookies are doing a classic knee jerk reaction and ordering way more than they actually need "So this never happens again." Just like in the "good old days," this leads to large shipments which effectively contain 1) What you have back orders for, 2) What you actually need for true consumption, and 3) A whole bunch of JIC (Just in Case) inventory. By the way, the stuff in #3 is by far the majority. So in effect we're shipping tons of stuff that we don't really need and this is clogging the arteries preventing them from moving what we actually need.

I could go on for hours on this topic because I have a lot of experience in both what works and what doesn't, but this isn't the proper forum for it. Hopefully this short dissertation will help at least some of my fellow S&F members understand what's really happening though. And again, this is a very complex situation so no single, simple solution is going to fix it.

**TooStroked** · 08-11-2021, 10:55 AM

Originally Posted by XstreamVking

Solution, bring all critical major mfg back to the continental US. If you are a US company, all parts must be made in the US. Not 20% or 60 %. but 100%. We could do it if we wanted. Stuff coming in would have a giant tariff. Wait, wasn't this the previous admin's plan? Yes it was, now we know why. Say it out loud, china is out to wreck our production capability and steals everything they can product development wise.

On the surface, this sounds like a very obvious solution. Dig a little deeper though and one runs into "issues." For instance, the cost of doing business in the good old USA keeps getting driven up by things like the $15/hr. minimum wage (which drives up all wages), increased regulations, new / mandatory time off with pay, higher taxes on corporations, etc. These increased costs would have to be passed on to consumers, but consumers don't want to pay more for their (insert name of product), so corporations do the only thing they can do - shift production to lower cost locations.

True story. A number of years ago, country singer Toby Keith - who is from Oklahoma - found out a textile manufacturer in his home state was going to close due to foreign competition. He wanted to buy the company and make blue jeans. Cool! People were thrilled. Then he started digging into the numbers. He found out he couldn't even manufacture the jeans for anywhere near what the foreign made jeans were retailing for. End of story.

Getting back to making everything here, one has to remember that we've chased whole industries out of the country - and they're never coming back. Did you know that the equipment used to manufacture microfiber towels doesn't even exist in the US? (That's just one example.) If Mercury (or anybody else) decided to actually make all of their products, parts and sub-assemblies here, the already ridiculous costs would go even higher. Do you really want that? Could we even afford it? Unfortunately, I think not.

I've been to China and you know what? The people there are much like all of us. They want a better life than their parents had, but they're willing to work their asses off for next to nothing to get it. We have it pretty darn good, but nobody wants to work any harder to get even more. And don't even get me started on millennials. They all want to sit on the couch and make $100,000 a year for doing next to nothing. Like I said before, not a simple problem and no simple answers.