Patent ID: 7997222

Claim:
In combination a plurality of non-steerable outboard motors each adapted to be mounted on a stern of a boat and an engine control system for controlling the outboard motors when the outboard motors are mounted to the boat, each of said outboard motors comprising: an internal combustion engine, a shift mechanism, an actuator adapted to drive at least one of the shift mechanism and a throttle valve of the engine, and a controller adapted to control operation of the actuator, the engine control system comprising: a navigation unit having a steering wheel installed to be freely operable by an operator and a steering angle detector adapted to produce an output indicative of a steering angle of the steering wheel, wherein the outboard motors are configured to be fastened to the boat in a manner such that the motors cannot be rotated laterally relative to the boat for all steering operations of the motors, and wherein the control system is configured such that each of the controllers of the outboard motors respectively control the operation of the actuator of the corresponding outboard motor cooperatively based on the output of the steering angle detector, to regulate a traveling direction of the boat.