If you own an Yamaha Outboard than you have already met Nick Kelly.

 

West Coast Marine Service

Over the last ten years, it’s been no secret who the go-to person is around town to service your Yamaha outboards. Nick Kelly is the owner of West Coast Marine Service located at 1555 Newport Blvd in Costa Mesa is that go to person.

Nick was born in Newport Beach at Hoag Hospital and recalls his father introducing him to a dinghy with an outboard at a very young age allowing him free access to the harbor as soon as he was able to start the outboard himself. “I recall jumping into the dinghy with two of my friends and spending the entire day on the harbor with them. I have another fond memory of one Halloween when my father made an outboard motor costume for me,” Nick said. While away at college Nick took a Diesel mechanics class “just for fun” at a local community college. “This is when the puzzle all came together for me deciding I wanted to become a mechanic,” Nick said.

Shortly after college Kelly opens West Coast Marine Service and has not looked back. I then asked about the part shortages like almost all industries are facing around the world these days. “ I placed my order in for new engines mid-summer last year and I am hoping to receive them before March of this year, the odds of me adding on to the order appears to be rather challenging at this point. In regards to finding parts for our customers, we have become very efficient at rebuilding parts. It’s not how I like to do things yet I have to keep my clients running and on the water over this next year.” Kelly said.

Regarding maintenance, Kelly could not express enough every 100 hours or annually haul out to change the lower end oil, check the spark plugs, and filters. Like in most all boats, owners need to make sure there is no fishing line wrapped around the props causing larger problems.

I did not realize that West Coast Marine Service has its own boat trailers allowing them to pick up customer’s boats, bring them to the shop for engine service along with other maintenance items such as bottom painting. If the boats are too big for the trailers the shipyards in town place their first call into West Coast Marine anytime a Yamaha outboard is involved.

Tate & Nick Kelly

While walking the docks is quite obvious that most of the marine manufacturers are all offering boats driven by outboard motors. Companies like Hunt, Mag Bay, Hinckley all your upper-end yachts are all offering outboards while expanding to larger vessels each year. It makes sense also, with fewer acoustics problems, better engine accessibility, more usable space aboard, fuel economy, and the list goes on. We all know that joke while walking down the dock and asking your friend why that boat has four outboards on it? The reply is 5 will not fit! If I was to speculate on the all-purpose vessels one might see only one or two outboards with the increase of horsepower we are seeing each year. This will allow these boats to have larger swim platforms.

I then inquired about electric outboards in the near future? “ That’s a good question, the marine industry will always follow the car and other industries. Maybe not as fast, the first couple of tries have not caught on yet I feel it’s safe to say we will see the change soon.” Kelly said.

Kelly was also excited to tell me about his new fishing charter business. If I recall correctly he picked up a Parker 28 and is outfitting it with all the newest features that Yamaha has to offer such as the new XTO phase charging systems. This way he can demonstrate the new systems to prospective buyers along with a platform to take out fishing charters.

My last question for Nick was how do you like to go boating? “ I enjoy it all from sailboat cruising with my whole family, taking the kids to Moonstone, or just going fishing with the gang yachting has always been a big part of my life. I’ve done many delivers down the California Coast along with a Hawaii delivery after a Trans Pac I enjoy it all. With the Kidds entered in junior sailing now.

I need to apologize to Kelly because my recording from our interview is not replaying and I am trying to remember our 40-minute conversation. What I do recall without any hesitation is that every one of my customers from Dana Point to Cabrillo Beach with Yamaha outboards tells me that Nick Kelly and at West Coast Marine is the go-to person. 

Sea ya