TTT

i think someone needs to tell dustin to look at the board. i believe he's been working day & night trying to get customers boats ready for the havasu poker run and hasn’t really had time to even check his email.

UT-The simple fact that adding a supercharger to a motor, voids your warranty, would be a clear indication that you are taking a gamble by doing so. Money aside if I added a supercharger to my 2002 tahoe, I know that if it blows, GM certainly isn't covering the cost, that's the gamble I take. I have a friend who has trashed 8 motors in his boat, he sucked it up each time and keeps rebuilding, because he knew that high performance means NO warranty. Just because it worked on 99/100 before doesn't mean that it will work for you, just the proboability that it will. Heart surgery patients die on the table every week, but there are a lot of bypass patients walking the street.
I certainly want to give my condolences to you for the waste of money, time, and effort, before I say something to make you feel worse. However I welcome you to the large group of hotboat owners who has had their dream tarnished by parts failure. You know you called me last year about my Daytona and you indicated that you weren't looking to go fast, because your wife didin't like it, and then you go and add superchargers to a twin engine Daytona. The bug, to go fast, has you now and I don't see cure anytime soon. My suspicion is, that you are looking for some way to show your wife, it was someone else's fault. I would bet my house, that you had to assure her that it was safe, before she gave you the OK for the superchargers. How close is that horseshoe.
People like Dustin and Art don't make the decision to supercharge your boat for you, they try to make a simple system that anyone can operate. To my knowledge that is what they build. However its general knowledge that supercharged=decreased reliability. You can't say you didn't know that, unless boats in CA or AZ don't blow their motors up.
If that's the case then I'm moving, because I'm on my 9 or 10th in 12 years of hotrod boating.
P.S.- My so-called (radical) Daytona has run for two years without a parts failure one, so you just never know. However if it blows the crank thru the bottom of the boat this weekend, I will suck it up and fix it.
By the way this is just an unbiased opinion from a Procharger owner, not a Whipplecharged boat owner. For God's sake what is the $25,000 sh**, if that's what you paid that is what you ought to be sick over.

jspeeddemon - “The simple fact that adding a supercharger to a motor, voids your warranty, would be a clear indication that you are taking a gamble by doing so.”

I guess I just disagree with you. Possibly that is a traditional belief in the industry, but the legal system and specifically the UCC code might be interpreted differently. You see, you are referring to the commonly known legal theory of product liability recovery known as an “express warranty.” While I am leaning towards the legal theory known as “implied warranty of merchantability,” and “implied warranty of fitness for a particular purpose.”

The implied warranty of merchantability is created when goods are sold by a merchant with respect to goods of that kind. The most important aspect of merchantability is that the goods must be fit for the ordinary purposes for which such goods are used. The “fitness” arises when the seller has reason to know any particular purpose for which the buyer requires the goods, and the seller has reason to know that the buyer is relying on the seller’s judgment to select suitable goods.

Now the major difference of opinion here comes from the application of these standards. As far as I can tell so far, the tests of merchantability are broad, flexible standards whose application requires courts to exercise case-by-case discretion.

We can all relate to your comment about my wife - but its still a red herring!

Your comment about, “general knowledge that supercharged=decreased reliability” is important to this discussion. Possibly it is general knowledge. But I am curious, wouldn’t the printed advertisement from a manufacture claiming their, “Supercharges 500SC system allows maximum performance to be obtained from a stock engine without sacrificing reliability” supercede that general knowledge?

jspeeddemon – An additional though on “general knowledge.”

Over many years in this industry, I have learned how to be patient and collect facts. Then, using reason to arrange the data, arrive at a conclusion. If I form a conclusion from the facts and if I know my judgment is sound, I will act on it – even though others differ.

I am not right nor wrong because the crowd disagrees with me. I will be right because my data and reasoning are right. You must have the courage of your knowledge and experience because courage my friend is the supreme virtue AFTER adequate knowledge and experience are at hand.

You certainly write a nice fluid repsonse. I like how you laid out the facts without touching on your inherent desire to use emotional responses. I can really respect that. I threw the dig in about the wife, because when not in her presence, men talk a big ol game, but in most instances, honey plays a larger role than they would have you believe about their decisions, powerboat or otherwise. You handled it gracefully and you just earned a whole lot of respect points for that.
To the real issue at hand, again I sympathize with your loss, and by discussing this, I don't want to let that issue be misconstrued. However to the merchantability, I believe the issue is that their are too many, way too many variables to truly identify what actaully destroyed your motor. It would be difficult to pin whipplecharger as the lone culprit. I don't think that you can honestly have a expert mechanic stand in front of a jury and tell you he knows exactly what happened. Like you said, you didn't do anything wrong, but neither did the people who got on those flights on 9/11. Although they knew there was a risk, however slight it may be, that the plane could get highjacked or crash. No matter how many successful flights flew the day before it didn't guarantee their success, and it didn't. It's the law of probability, and you happen to have the one motor, that maybe due to being slightly weak from the factory, never to rear its ugly head of destruction, unless you supercharge it. Maybe those pistons, rings, and bearings were just the weakest of a batch. If you can prove that several others who used this system have had similar trouble, then I think you have a point. I certainly have trouble believing that as eloquently as you write, that you would be nieve enough to believe, that this wasn't a risky proposition to supercharge those motors. You weighed the options, of how others did this successfully, and gambled that it was ok. 99/100 times it would be, but yours wasn't. Using the heart surgery as an example before, just because someone dies on the table having bypass surgery, doesn't mean that all bypass surgeries are just as risky as that one. It means that the combination of the surgery coupled with that persons makeup they didn't tolerate the procedure. That brings you back to the original manufacture of the engine or Eliminator. Don't kill the surgeon(Whipplecharger) he was trying to improve the quality of life. Mercury marine, certainly is going to disclaimer your warranty becuase you suprecharged it, so they are clear of this issue unless you can prove they built you a motor with less than standard parts. I think what Dustin said about the water pressure issue is certainly a grave concern, relating to the failure. Now you must prove that their product , having two small blocks in a 26 Daytona, wasn't researched well enough and it cause your motor failure. You may very well have had this problem come up eventually due to the water problem, the supercharger just magnified the cycle of failure. I honestly believe that putting together 100 replicas of your combination of parts, in other types of boats doesn't end with the same result in 99 of them. Their are too many Whipplecharged boats running reliably, for that to be the case. I think the problem lies in identifying exactly what cause this to happen, but supercharging wan't the only culprit, probably not the main culprit. Good luck toyou sincerely whatever you work out!

Uncle Toys & Jspeedemon- I'm impressed.

Now with that said, UT have you decided on what you are going to do? New motors? blowers again? maybe prochargers?

Well said Mike good to hear from you, did you get that new motor home yet? maybe when season rolls around again I will make it out your way, hope all is well
Mark

H2XMark Thanks, Dustin has my new motor on the dyno as we speak. We are hoping to have them mapped and back in the boat before the weekend. I will be using my boat more then usual this winter since I missed the summer. By the way the fact that my boat is not done is nobodies fault but my own. I have had a crazy summer with work. Things have been great and we have done a ton of cool things this year. You should come out this way for sure.

I failed to mention in the last post that I have no doubt that the Supercharger systems that Whipple makes is by far the best in the boat industry. Again I said that “I” have no doubt. That does not mean people can’t disagree with me. I can’t imagine any other system would be able to make the power that we did on my last motors. My boat outran a lot of monster blown big blocks packages and that does not come easy. The Whipple systems makes more power, runs smoother, have greater fuel economy, They have a great staff, are easy to install, They do what it takes to make people happy, & not to mention they look very cool.

Pyle

Here's a picture of the 496 525HP package we have.

Thanks,
Dustin