Lookin good John. She should be getting close to getting wet now.

Yep...ran into a Bravo issue today. Seems that the input shaft splines on one of the drives I bought from that guy in Sarasota are twisted so we're replacing that, checking the upper bearings and replacing seals to be on the safe side. I'm hoping for 1st ~ 2nd week of January for my first sea trial. I'm getting very close.

Still one of my favorite looking old birds. John get it done!

Awesome man. Can't wait to hear how it goes.

The boat looks great. I like the Formula letters on the deck. The look of the boat name lettered out on the deck is just cool to me. Formula has that in some of their graphic options in different years and I like it so much I may put it on mine too.


I just got a power package to drop stock power back into my SS. I converted from Alpha to Bravo so how much adjustment difference do you think I will have to deal with in the shifter and cables? Is the stroke and adjustments the same across those two drives?

This conversion is my first rodeo so I am carefully feeling my way around to make sure it is all done right.

Well Sir...we will learn this one together. I have the OEM Bravo Shift cables that came with the 2008 Bravo transom assemblies I bought. I will be using the OEM Formula/Morse throttle/shift setup (from the helm) to start with and I will let you know how that goes real soon. This is a real test for me because I'm moving from 35 year old "Pre-Alpha" technology to Bravo. My old shift brackets mounted to the engine bell housings and now my new ones mount to the exhaust manifolds. I'm sure there will be a bit of tweaking involved...we will know real soon.

I think the Formula "European" style deck logo is classy as well. No mistake in making "Brand Recognition" from the air.

I am probably going to break in with "Old School" Mercruiser 21" Stainless props primarily because I have a very good pair. My rigger tells me he sees me going to 23" Bravo I's real quick and depending on how that runs out maybe even go to 25". Being "Old school" I have ZERO experience with the prop development for these rigs over the past 10~15 years. Hell, back when this boat was new...cleavers were the prop of choice...they were a bit of a dog out of the hole but pulled like a "Bat out of Hell" on the top. I'm sure the newer technology is light years better...I'm open to suggestion from those that know more than I ...which includes just about anybody LOL.

The other thing that came up is setting the drives up with the port side spinning opposite rotation...anyone doing that with hands on experience as to the result?

I would post in the prop section your boat/motor/drive combo and Brett from BBlades should be able to get you close on what props to start with.

Thanks... very good suggestion.

Mine was 87 model Alpha, Gen1 so most of the Quicksilver stuff was similar between the two. That will help me out some but I'm not usually lucky.

Yours is a lot further back so I guess we will see how much Merc has remained the same or changed up.

Don't pull your hair out getting it done.