All good points. As I understand it, Formula's lack of production of Fastech's over the last few years was due to both the downturn an excessive dealer stock that had to be bought back and eventually disposed of. The effect was to drive down the price of both new and used Formulas.
As has been pointed out, Formula's quality is a double-edged sword. The long life and lack of tooling changes does make used models more appealing. Nonetheless, I still think the discounts being offered are fair, and should be appealing to buyers who want a new boat.
I'm just glad that Formula's other lines have saved the company. They are really good people who take pride in their products and have treated me very well.

I will bow out to your PQ knowledge but I can't remember a single person in the FL powerboat club showing up with a new PQ of any size since I joined as a member in 2004. FPC has boats from all over North America do its poker runs so they tend to have just about every brand covered vs. a regional poker run that tends to have lots of local boats (PQ from Michigan would mean a Great Lakes run would have lots of MI made boats).

Despite anything being said about fastechs, whether they're dated or whether they aren't doing as good as other companies or whatever the case may be, I will say that formula is the ONLY company to bring any type of real speedboat to the new York show in the past couple years and for that, I applaud them.

there are those who apparently have a persistent bug up the azz about the 353/Formula FasTechs...

I ask have you spent any time in one?
A whole day?
An entire weekend?

Does the 353 in particular...

Ride well?
Forgiving and stable?
Overall very seaworthy?
Does the 353 make excellent use of space?
Have the near perfect allotment of individual spaces and dimensions for a 34' performance boat?
Use high quality material and vendors throughout?
Have excellent fit and finish?
Rigged at the very top end for a production boat?
Pack a TON of well thought-out, well placed ammenities?
Is the boat easy to use in terms of egress/layout for sunning, beach-time, cruising, running hard, and staying aboard?
Have excellent support from the manufacturer?
Does the product get respect consistantly dockside or at the ramp? Does it make a statement?

If you say NO to any of these points I say you've never been near one for more than 5 minutes!

So what do you do with a boat like this? Change it up and risk loosing any individual goodness noted above just for the sake of change ?

believe it or not, some things are done so right, accomplish the manufacturer's mission to the intended audience so well to begin with, they are a hard act to follow.

So now you can only piss about the speed/bottom.
No, not the fastest
but frankly only one bottom is any given day and the rest as you would say...
"are outdated and need a redesign"

I dont agree......Obviously you very much like your 29 footer and Formula. Formula does make a very nice boat, but you can pick one out from a mile away with the same ole 4-5 paint schemes. The carpet in the salon of the one pictured in this thread looks like Chit. Looks like some old house carpeting. And having to step up and over to enter the head..... ?

I like my 45 footer and the ammenties along with the head room. The deck on the Sonic allows for the head room. With Sonic you can and could of had pretty much any paint you wanted from the factory from 2000 and up..... thats hardly dated, and the new 39 is over the top in fit/finish, quality and updates. The interior is set up nice too....I would bet the room & seating below in a 35 Sonic surpasses the room in a 35 Fastech.

Irregrdless, both are nice brands. Its good that everyone has the freedom to choose what they like.

In this economy many cant afford to totally change everything up. When you start your own boat company, you can do just that as ofter as you wish. Besidies when something isnt broken, no need to fix it. Sonic held a pretty good pace with getting new boats out and sold and seems to have a good pace going right now. The Formula cruiser line is moving, the Fastech line isnt unfortunately.

I've never thought of my boat as "dated" looking at all. I actually think the fancy OL type paint jobs look "dated" one or two years later while mine is rather timeless.

Oh well.....my boat is basically going to be all new shortly and better than "factory".

Your paint is timeless and looks great. I agree the over the top paint jobs do date the boat, as do certain colors.

Saying Formula has done nothing is only correct if you look at the 3 boats in the Fastech line. However, as I am sure you know, they have a huge line of other boats, that they HAVE been putting money into, because those are the boats that keep them going.

You can hardly compare what a one off custom builder like Skater, OL, and Nortech do compared to Formula. They build a super high quality production boat. They aren't and never were trying to be one of the companies you listed.

sorry for being so harsh on the sonics. glad you are enjoying yours!!!!

I'm just curious... How many new 35 - 45 ft. Sonics were built last year???