The 4.6-liter V8 is a
reengineered version of
the 64-degree aluminum
block from their 300R.E
ric Glaser was jet-lagged aft er traveling overnight from
a Mediterranean holiday to Nashville, but you’d never
know it. Th e Midnight Express co-owner stood smil-
ing at the helm of his company’s 43 Open and looked
back at the color-matched, 2,250 ponies hanging from
its transom. “I didn’t want to miss this,” Glaser told me and then
suggested to those aboard to get a handhold. With that, Glaser
fi rewalled the throttles and a 52-knot cruise quickly escalated
into a 79-knot WOT on the tabletop-fl at lake. Th e fi ve power-
plants pinned me to my bolster seat, the mid-range torque on
full display. It was a fi tting reception from Mercury Racing’s new,
450-hp powerhouse.
Th e Fond du Lac, Wisconsin manufacturer claims their new,
top-of-the-line outboard takes the throne with the best power-
to-weight ratio in the industry. Utilizing a reengineered 4.6-liter
V8 found on their 300-hp models, the engine produces a whop-
ping 40 percent more torque than their 400-hp outboard.
“It’s raw performance in a premier package,” said Mer-
cury Marine General Manager Stuart Halley. “Mercury
Racing combines out-of-this-world capability with real-
world applications.”
I saw that unabashed power—particularly in the midrange—on
a number of vessels on Old Hickory Lake in June when Mercury
Racing invited us to Blue Turtle Bay Marina outside of Nashville to
sea trial ten vessels with a variety of engine confi gurations, from a
Sea Ray SLX-R 350 with twin 450Rs to the 59-foot Cigarette Tir-
ranna with hex 450-hp engines. Other boats featured engine con-
fi gurations in triple, quad and quint pairings.
As Mercury’s bespoke engine division, Mercury Racing “po-
sition ourselves like AMG to Mercedes,” Director of Marketing
Steve Miller told me with their eye on the luxury, high-perfor-
mance market. And the 450R delivers: At 689 pounds, the engine
is over 300 pounds lighter than its competitors—that’s nearly the
same weight as the 400R. (For comparison, the 527-hp Seven
Marine tips the scales at 1,094 pounds and Yamaha’s 425 XTO
weighs 952 pounds.) It also runs on common, 89-octane fuel.
“Th ere’s nothing out there that touches it,” Miller said, “and noth-
ing else more advanced in our portfolio.”
To extract all those horses and snapback torque, the 64-degree
aluminum block utilizes a belt-driven, water-cooled, twin-screw
supercharger that delivers no-lag throttle response throughoutMerc’s New Powerhouse
POWER & TECHNOLOGY
The 450-hp, supercharged 4.6-liter V8 is Mercury’s most powerful outboard to date.
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By Jeff Moser