To provide an outboard motor constituted to suppress increase of size of an engine cover.
This outboard motor 1 has a suction valve 17 and an exhaust valve 18 provided in a cylinder head 14, a cam shaft 20 arranged substantially vertically in the cylinder head to open, close, and drive the suction valve and the exhaust valve, a valve operation characteristic switching device 29 driven hydraulically to change operation characteristic of either of the suction valve and the exhaust valve, a selector valve (a solenoid valve 27) controlling oil pressure supplied into the valve operation characteristic switching device, and an exhaust passage part (an exhaust manifold body 23) fixed to a side face of the cylinder head. The selector valve is arranged at a position (a cavity G) where it is overlapped on an upper end face of the exhaust passage part on a side of the cylinder head. Since a control valve of the valve operation characteristic switching device is provided in a section which becomes a dead space in an engine, size of the engine cover is not increased.
BUNGO KEIICHIRO
YONEZAWA OSAMU
