Classic 22 with arneson
 

Hello All,

I originally posted all this up on Donzi.net but thought since I had some questions from fellow members I thought I might introduce myself and share my project.
I was having problem after problem with my traditional drive and was tired of dealing with drive issues and the wife was not having it. So it was either an XR or Arneson. I called and spoke with Rick and even before I bought the unit he was more than willing to help me understand why the Arneson would work on my boat, he really is a very patient, friendly, and very knowledgeable guy, he is a real asset to the boating community.

If you have any questions, comments, or otherwise please feel free to ask.

I picked up a used Bravo conversions asd6 kit and started with the conversion.

So here it goes.

Step 1, adapt my BBF to the Velvet drive.
http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h5...psgsta6zsk.jpg
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More to come...

Next remove the engine and old drive.
http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h5...pshl7vvjfj.jpg
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Next Rick described to put a board under the boat so that the stand off box is about 1" above the lowest point of the boat. basically you dont want the box dragging in the water. If it does, it will push the bow down. Mark the top and bottom of the box and make sure that everything clears and should work. Later we will makes sure the next unit is centered.

http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h5...psvukyrk6x.jpg
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To make sure the box is centered I made a paper template of the exact box and marked the centers of all the holes. Then I center punched the stud holes and prepped to drill.

I made a jig to drill the holes perfectly square to the transom, all worked out great.

http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h5...psxfrfeaxr.jpg
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I used the inner motor mount for a template of what I will probably need to cut out for the transmission to fit.

Next I needed to move to a crank mounted water pump because the original was mounted in the drive. Being a 460 I didn't have a lot of options so I made everything that I needed.
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I cleaned up the bilge while I was at it.
http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h5...pst9scn3mi.jpg

Then I started mounting things up.

http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h5...psey9wo7jn.jpg

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Next I wanted an original equipment look for the dash and other stuff so I fabricated a piece to hold the Char-Lynn behind the original steering mount. It looks factory, and I'm happy.
http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h5...psjykxrw3t.jpg

Testing on the trailer
https://youtu.be/T0fssv-53Ok https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0fssv-53Ok

Next was on the water testing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4ZIDJ03-ZQ

I also had a buddy film from the bar to see how the boat was reacting.

I know a lot of people have been saying that the Arneson doesn't come up on plane quickly, but for the first run I have not had any issues, and it comes up very quickly.

My first impressions are very positive and I was really shocked at how smooth it felt in comparison to the original drive. It also feels like the boat is 1000lbs lighter and ready to run.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Eb1t52pIks

Very cool 22! The first link worked and I just followed to your next vid on youtube. Great looking boat!

Bit easier to see the vid from the first post on the page..........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Eb1t52pIks Cool project. Nice methodical work, boat looks great.

RR

Awesome to see you got this going, was a great looking project when I saw it. I still am getting my boat finished up hopefully in the next two weeks or so. That looks way better than the King Cobra! Hope to see you up at Tahoe this summer.
Scott

What props have you tried ?

Thanks for taking the time to share! Looks like a sweet setup. Do you have speed/cruise comparison numbers? What speeds were you seeing with the old drive and what with the arneson?

Looks great!!!! What kind of MPH you seeing out of now vrs with the old setup?

I haven't really built it for an all out high speed boat, if I could hit 85 and not be blowing parts out the back I'd be happy and that is what it is propped for.

I have only taken out it once for testing and I decided that i wouldn't break 60ish because I wanted to test and check everything before going any faster. I can say this, it excellerates like never before... I used to have to excelerate, trim, excelerate, trim, etc. now you just slam the power down and go. With the old drive you never felt yourself being pushed back into the seat, you do now.

More videos and tuning to come.

Very Cool Project!! Thanks for posting

So far I have only tried the 1 three blade stainless 18x29 prop.

This time i ran the prop guard and I felt that I had less bow lift, so next time ill run without it and if it has more bow lift then it is staying off.

I do have one question for the community. After I am running hard for some time (30 min at 60ish) and all the temps start to rise I feel that the steering begins to become vague and I keep turning to the left. Once I drop the speed it comes back. are bubbles in the oil cause this? Or high oil PS temps?

I am not running any reservoir beyond the standard Bravo PS pump. Should I add something?

What else would cause this? To be honest it is very small, if there at all, but I just don't like the idea of it.

Thanks for any and all information.

That first video looked like the San Joaquin River / Port of Stockton. If so, maybe I will see you around on the Delta.

Do you run a power steering cooler , you can run it hard then shout it off and look at the power steering fluid to see if it is full of foam

Yes I run an integrated PS cooler that is part of my engine oil cooling, it is sold by CP Performance, its the 3". My steering helm get hot to the touch my guess is about 160*. What is to hot? Next time I'm out ill try my IR temp gun and see what it is getting to.

Good idea on checking the fluid, its just difficult to get to the top of the pump with my configuration.

Thanks!


Yes that video was taken on the Delta, I just made the run from Disco bay to Locke this Saturday. Man that river is moving! Hope to see you!

Ok, so I am now cleaning up the baot and I am checking all of the oils. I found that the power steering fuild appears to have been pumped out of the reservoir through the cap and into the bilge. The pump is almost dry. Any ideas as to what would cause this besides foaming?

Can I install a remote reservoir when the pump that I am using has the built in reservoir like all of the other Mercury units? And if I can im assuming it has to be at the same height or it would siphon out?


Best,
Matt P.

Congrats

What I did with mine was cut the cap part of the pump off weld a 1in black pipe coupling in it"s place and weld up the return port , I used the top for the return form the reservoir .[IMG]http://i882.photobucket.com/albums/a...psotb7mvgx.jpg[/IMG]

Awesome, do you have a picture of the pump?

Thanks for the help!

I don't have a picture but the boat is in my shop so I will take a picture tonight

the pictures are not all that good I tried to keep all the lines as big as I could for easy return and capacity as Rik wanted me to have a 1gal reservoir I don't have that much space to spare [IMG]http://i882.photobucket.com/albums/a...psm0ymz0vy.jpg[/IMG][IMG]http://i882.photobucket.com/albums/a...psxwyg8eaf.jpg[/IMG]

1 Gal reservoir:eek:

Why do you need such a large reservoir? Is Rick referring to the expansion capacity? That would make sense because of the volume in the system I guess.

1 gallon because he has two pumps pumping 4gpm each.. That means a 1 gallon reservoir is being turned over volume wise once every 7.5 seconds..

The oil needs time to come in and get back out as well as loose some of the air out too.

The oil is gravity feed to the pumps but pumped back into the reservoir. This is why the reservoir is typically mounted to the bulkhead and the lines go to the engine pumps.

I've been following this on the Donzi forum and glad to see it here where it will get a lot more exposure. 85 mph is a good speed goal. I'm still looking forward to seeing your final results and impressions. Good job. Could be more of us doing this mod.

Thank you Rick, I have ordered up a reservoir and will be removing the pump and welding in the necessary fittings. Out of curiosity how hot is to hot for power steering fluid? Is there an ideal temp?

THis replaces the pump cap, and allows for an external tank

http://www.cpperformance.com/p-11482...-dump-cap.aspx

THe problem you may run into is gravity. The tank needs to be higher then the top of the pump. THere is not a lot of room to pull that off.on a 22. Its possible but may take some creativity.

I should have about 8" of a 45 degree drop, do you think that is enough?

The cap states that it is 1/4npt, that's pretty small....I'm thinking I might need to machine that out, am I wrong?

Forgot to mention, thank you! That should save me a ton of time!

people use those caps all the time without a problem....

1/4" npt is bigger than the 1/4" indicates. Hole diameter is probably somewhere between .400" and .500" Too lazy to go downstairs in garage to measure one. LOL.

I have two of those caps that I did not use , I did not like the way they were held on or the 1/4in port , 1/4in pipe has around a .350 id