Drive Replacement Questions

[FormulaM2Formula]

All,

I posted this in General Tech. Chris (aka RedDog382) had this to say about XR vs XR Sportmaster on a 382. Anyone else heard anything?

See under the quote for the rest of the story. It appears likely that I will be buying at least one XZ drive, and maybe two new XRs or something else.

The race on the inside of the upper case where the input shaft goes in is all boogered up. The dealer says it would need a new case. All the upper gears are blown to bits. They didn't take the port apart yet. Both drives have ~93 hours on them.

Originally Posted by RedDog382

Garrett,

I have heard sportmaster lowers will slow the 382 down 1-2 m.p.h. You might also loose just a little going to XR. Theory is it takes a little more hp to turn the straight cut gears and fatter shafts. Less likely to break down though.

My friend here just ate up a standard Bravo on his '98 382 with 525SC motors this weekend and he is considering the upgrade to XRs.

Should have my motor back Friday!

Chris

Hi Chris,

Congrats on getting the motor back. My boat has been at the dealer for 4 weeks (they were backed up). I'm not anticipating getting it back anytime soon.

Back to the drives:
I was thinking I could get the shorty sportmaster lowers on new XRs and solve my deep propshaft dimension at the same time as the upgrade.

I just got back from the boat dealer. They said that the boat currently has Bravo XZ drives which are a little better than standard Bravo 1's but not as good as the XRs.

The starboard XZ drive tore up all the upper gears and mangled the case where the input shaft come in. They said it would need new upper gears and a new upper housing. They didn't even take the bottom apart yet, but they would have to take it apart too to get all the metal out and check the lower gears. They are waiting until they hear from me what I want to do. They are saying that a new Bravo XZ is $11k and a new standard (not sportmaster) XR is $13k. This sounds high to me, but I don't know.

I hate to spend this much money on new drives, but I don't want to replace an XZ for $11k and then blow another XZ and then I will have wished I had just plunked it all down at once and gotten two new XR's.

Is there any other alternatives once spending this kind of cash?

The dealer said that this is just for the drive and that the old transom assemblies will work fine with the new XR's. Is this right?

Thx,
Garrett

[PhantomChaos]

I can say verify the XR uses more power. I have one XR and one XZ now and the XR is about 200RPM lower at WOT.

[Audiofn]

Go with the XR. OR take it all off and go Konrad and then you will have a box as well for the money

[RedDog382]

Originally Posted by Audiofn

Go with the XR. OR take it all off and go Konrad and then you will have a box as well for the money

It certainly would be interesting to see what the Konrad's would do for a 382 if someone was able to pony up the $$ for the conversion.

[FormulaM2Formula]

After checking out a few options, I decided to have Mr. Gadget aka Dick Tryce, build me a couple of drives. He's building XR uppers w/ IMCO shorty lowers. This should solve my drive height problem at the same time as fixing my drive issues. I should be able to sell my remaining XZ drive.

I'm a little concerned about water pressure issues with the IMCO lowers. I'm thinking about adding a seastrainer and water dump to each engine to keep the water pressure below 25 psi.

Does anyone have any experience w/ IMCO's on the 382 as far as water pressure goes?

Any recommendations for strainers and pressure relief valves?

If I add dumps, I thought I would go ahead and put in dual dumps for each engine so they'll be there for possible future whipple upgrades. I figure that will happen in about 2011.

Garrett