Why Manufacturer Maintenance Intervals Matter (And Why They All Differ)

Ask around any marina about oil change intervals and you’ll get confident answers. Every 100 hours. Every 250. Once a season. Whatever the guy at the yard said.

The truth is all those answers may be correct. Just not for the engine on your boat.

We pulled the published maintenance schedules for three marine diesels of roughly the same size, the kind of inboard engine you’d find in a 35 to 45 foot sailboat. The schedules have some significant differences.

Buying a Used Boat? How to Evaluate Its Maintenance History

A survey tells you what condition a boat is in today. Maintenance history tells you how it got there, and gives you a much better idea of what’s coming next.

That distinction matters more than most buyers realize. Two boats can survey similarly and have very different futures ahead of them, depending on whether previous owners stayed ahead of problems or waited for things to break.

The Real Cost of Deferred Maintenance: Why “Later” Gets Expensive

Every boat owner knows the feeling. You notice something that needs attention (a small drip, a slight squeak, a fitting that looks a little corroded), but you’re busy, the weather’s perfect, and it doesn’t seem urgent. So you file it away under “I’ll deal with it later.”

The problem is that boats don’t wait for later. And on the water, small problems have a remarkable talent for becoming big, expensive ones.

Time-Based vs. Hours-Based Maintenance: Which Schedule Does Your Equipment Need?

One of the most common questions we hear from new boat owners is some version of: “How do I know when this is actually due?”

It’s a great question, and the answer isn’t always obvious. Some maintenance should happen on a calendar schedule—every six months, every year—regardless of how much you use your boat. Other maintenance depends entirely on how many hours your equipment has run. And some equipment needs both.

5 Essential Tips for Getting Started with MaintenanceROS

Starting anything new and maintenance-related on a boat can feel overwhelming, especially when it distracts from the whole purpose of owning a boat - being out on the water. Getting started with MaintenanceROS is straightforward, but a little preparation makes the process even smoother.

These five tips—learned from helping hundreds of boat owners set up their accounts—will have you up and running efficiently, tracking maintenance with confidence in under an hour.