I've posted in Formula forum as well. Looking for advice. I'm looking a several used Formulas. Some SS's but also a couple of PC's. I know this isn't a PC forum but it is a very knowledgable forum so here goes. I found a very clean 2005 37 PC that has 900 hours on it's 496's. Price is good at 99K, for an 05, but I think high for the engine hours. Also, maybe even more important, it has no service records available. Would you run from this like my friend says to do? What besides manifolds and risers would be a problem? Owners only had it since June and same broker sold it to him says it has a clean survey from June avaliable to see with a contract.

you should be able to get a merc tech to scan the ecm's on those engines and get you information on how they were run at specific rpm's. So if they come back as majority of the hours spent below 1000rpm's then that would lead me to believe they did alot of idling around...on the other hand if it comes back with majority of hours spent at 4000-5000 rpm's then the engines have been worked hard for those 900 hrs....

they should be able to show you something like this:
http://images.boats.com/resize/wp/2/...9/img13541.jpg

will also verify the actually hours on the engines and not just what a gauge says on the dash if someone left the ign on by mistake for hours at a time!

yep. Plug in verify what has been going on. My boat shows one side with 300 hours (its about 50 hours higher than what actually is on that motor)

Thanks. I've decided to move on and look at lower hour boats. Not worth the worry.

Good decision...it's pretty much rebuild time for those motors.

should i say my engine hours? lol ! ))

There are exceptions to every rule.