the boat already had the transom assemblies mounted on it when I bought it. I only removed them to re-gel the boat. Not sure what motors were in it before, but my small blocks pretty much just dropped in and bolted up. A little time wiggling them around to align and I was all set.

Sabercatt, I will stop at the Morton Salt plant in Chicago on Monday, and see what I can do about getting that salt sent down to you. In a few months there will be enough on the roads around here to make any boat pick up a few MPH's.:p

aint that the truth!

Hey sabercatt, I boat out of Eastport Marina. It looks like you boat out of East Peoria Boat Club! Your restoration of your boat looks AWESOME!!!!! Maybe when the river goes down a little bit we can get some boatin' done! Dave

I actually boat out of eastport, but the boat club is only a mile from my shop, and I dont have plates on the trailer. hopefully the river drops fast. good weather right now.

Looks great, nice clean work!

Well in between other projects, I have been trying to get some interior work done. Going to try and get a bit more seat time this weekend. hopefully in a seat this time. used the valance panel (or whatever you want to call it) off the 353 to make a backrest. Still have to sew up a seat bottom. Got the vinyl in from mcleod. Trying to get the seats recovered, along with the side panels, etc etc. heres a few pics.

few more.

last ones for today. all this vinyl matches the hatch.

Everything is looking great ! At this pace, you'll be bored this winter with no work to do on the boat. :p

always something to be done. went out sat and today for a couple hours. everything went well. 4 adults, 1 child, 3/4 tank of fuel was running 59-60 at a shade over 5000. still trying to find two sets of larger props. have a few pieces of interior left to recover and the back seat to finish but sure looks sharp. everywhere I went, people came up to ask what it was. the fairing sure throws everyone off. heres a couple of pics from the weekend.

couple more

Your boat has really come together, looks great !

wow very nice sir!

i forgot. its cruises at 40mph at about 3200 rpm.

Was it difficult to do the upholstery? Did it come pre-cut or pre-sewn from Mcleod? It looks amazing, incredible job! I want my 311 back so I can update it the way I had planned.

well I had originally planned to just order the sheet vinyl and use my old seat parts as patterns. Stephanie at mcleod talked me into having them pre sew everything. It was a lot more money that way, but after getting it and starting to install, I was sure glad I went that route. It is still a considerable amount of work to install. especially the fiberglass valance around the bottom of the seats. The 2nd seat went pretty quickly after ironing out the details on the 1st. As is the case with everything on this project, by the time I was finishing up, I was starting to get pretty decent at it. I recovered the white side panels with the silver. The original panels used a non-foam backed vinyl, but I opted to leave the foam on the silver to give it a little more dimension and I'm glad I did. The 90° and less corners are pretty tricky to make look right, but after some trial and error I got them fairly decent. I still have a handful of pieces to recover, mainly the panels around the bottom of the dash and glovebox. It takes a lot of staples to put it all together. I've probably used 2500 or more already. I will be polishing up all the stainless hand rails, etc in the next day or two and getting them installed.

Thanks to everyone for the positive support!

not to be crude but how much more was it to get the material already sewn? hell since I am asking how much was it for the bolsters? I am looking at updating the 242 as a new boats seems to be slipping further away these days

I had it figured at about $400 dollars in materials, plus shipping. That was giving me a little extra to work with. I ended up at about 900 plus shipping. I did get 3 extra yards of white and 1 extra yard of silver to recover my rear seat and other misc panels. Took about a 10 days from my order till they arrived.

that is reasonable 900 plus your labor sounds good . just the time saved on sewing those bolsters sounds worth it

Thanks

I have read all your notes.I have to say what a great job you have done.Many hours of hard work.I have a 1991 292 with 502s that have been worked.I put imco steering and alum swim platform this past year,rebuilt both engines.I can appreciate the hard work you have done.My hats off to you...

Hats off to another completed Project Boat on the Formula forum! Glad it all worked out for you, and it's good to see another Volvo Penta boat out there. I'll trade 2 mph on top end for better cruise efficiency, dockside control and reliability any day.

Now we need to organize a "Project Boat" rally for 2009.

By the way - The DP drive fits a Bravo cutout the last time I checked.

Thanks! Its been a long hard road, and its not quite finished, but it feels good to be on the water. Lot more fun to work on now than before. Just need the warm weather to hang around so I can get some more late season boating in. Still really wanting to try some bigger props before the seasons over, but no luck yet. I tried to have a buddy take some pics of me and the boat out running hard, but not sure how they came out. Thanks to everyone for the support.

Show some pics. How does it perform with the 502's? how many horses they pushin? more info!

Just found this thread. Incredible! I was on the river last Saturday. Were you out? I would love to see this boat in person. Congrats on the project!!!

Saturday I was stuck working, but was out Sunday. Cruised up past henry and back, and then downtown for a bit. Will probably head out again this weekend as it may be the last time this year (at least on this boat). Your welcome to stop by and check it out anytime, just shoot me a pm.

Formula 292 W, 502s
 

I have had the best speed of 80 gps,it steady at 77,78.I feel the engines making 500 or so,made them like the the hp 500,spining bravo 4 blade 26 '.top out at 5250 rpm.