Florida is hot,fouling rate is horrible in summer, all the nooks and crannys in an I/0 are hard to properly antifoul to start with and once hard fouling critters attach, a diver can't get to all of them, lots of boats have stray current problems from their lousy maintenance, I/0s are aluminum, which can be bad news in salt water, especially warm salt water with even a little bit of electricity around, unless you are much more careful than most folks, including me. If you antifoul an drive, you better be damn certain that the applier knows not to use copper bottom paint. That happens down here waay more often than you would believe.
One doesn't have to be around very long to realize that I/0s (or outboards for that matter) don't do well kept in the water in Florida. Not to say it is impossible, just damn difficult.
Volvo: I'm not absolutely sure its true any more, but in times past, at least in Florida, there was little doubt that Volvo drives were more durable, much less likely to quit on you offshore. Volvos can be a pain, damned expensive parts, hard to find competent mechanics and sometimes the engineering is just crazy, but they are very very tough. That includes everything up through the 290 drive. I hope its still as true for the sx drive (what I have now).
Connor
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