It's all good if we all had the same motors how boring would that be

Ray's new old addage !

You can get a lot of people to agree on most things,

BUT

You can't get performance boaters to agree on almost anything !

Makes for a lot of interesting threads and discussion, that's for sure!

Viva Le Differance !

Best Regards,
Ray @ Raylar

A 30 skater with 800's should be in the 150 mph range. I think its cool that jim did the small blocks. It took balls and alot of hard work for him, i say give the guy respect for building his own stuff.

Hey guys, I completely agree that having different setups is what makes the performance boat world unique and interesting. And because of that reason, you don't see me slamming other guy's setups unless warranted. You can see from the comments in the above original post why I jumped on this thread and straightened some things out. What nobody realizes is that I was quite a few years ahead of Jim on the whole small block/30 Skater idea, but passed on it when Mike D'Anniballe told me they would not work as well as the big blocks he ended up building me. Mike built his company on successful small block race motors for offshore teams in the Middle East, so he is an expert on them (unlike Jim)........but talked me out of them because they would not make the horsepower and torque of my big blocks, nor would they be as reliable. So Jim can talk all the smack about big blocks he wants, but the proof is that the big block/30 Skater setups perform far superior to his small block setup - period. And by the way Jim, good thing you didn't take me up on the 28 race, as my buddy Joe Aballera's 28 has run 132 mph on GPS on Lake Havasu!

So how fast should a 30 be with 725s?

Just to cool the flames here, I have developed and built both big blocks and small block LS and otherwise engines for performance boats and I honestly feel there is a place and use for both. I think it is current thinking that some of the small blocks disadvantages versus big blocks is in the area of torque development at some of the lower and midrange rpms where a lot of performance boats spend most of their time. When the displacement of the small block is increased to big block ranges the power and torque development is pretty much on par. Some of this disadvantage of overall lower torque production can be sometimes overcome with higher rpm operating ranges that small blocks, especially the newer LS platforms, can use for higher rpm horsepower and with the right gearing and propping they can get great speed results in specially rigged boats. I believe Jim's engines are aluminum 427 cubic inch versions that make great high rpm horsepower but the larger cubic inch and stoke of a similar horsepower 510" or so big block is going to make more torque generally earlier and wider across the rpm band and will probably as in your case Skater 30 deliver more propshaft torque at lower rpms and with the a strong engine as we all know Mike D can and does build. This allows different drive ratios and gearing and can be more efficient. It should be a faster boat as built and rigged, but that does not diminsh the nice accomplishments of Jim's LS powered Skater.

Lets give Jim his credit due here as he was pretty much the first to invest, perfect and install a pair of high horsepower LS small blcoks in a good known commodity efficient cat performance boat over 28 feet and his final part is a nice example of the LS small block potential.

You don't think companies as good and smart as Ilmor would have invested all that money, engineering, development and production in the LS platform if they didn't think it had a good viable future in Performance boating do you ? Power to weight ratios even in boats do have good merit and as the power and cubic inch sizes of the newer LS offerings increase the results with their lighter package and space requirements will eventually transfer into new performance boat designs and builds where the weight advantage and added rpm ranges can be tailored to more specific performance.
Your not comparing aplles to apples here and as such its kinda a distorted comparison.

I think if Jim had or could have been able to use the LSX tall deck block and gotten the cubes up at lets say 496, those LS's would be producing a lot more torque at lower rpms and probably given any close equivalent normally aspirated BBC a good run for its money.

Skater 30 you obviously have a nice performing 30 foot Skater and at 150MPH with normally aspirated big blocks its also producing awesome results and Kudo's to you for putting it together. Its always good for friendly disagreement and differing vues and opinions but attacks are distructive and senseless!

I guess what I am saying here is don't use the accomplishments you have attained to diminish someone elses hard earned accomplishments !

This goes for both of you, you both have great boats and accomplishments, but remember its HARD TO BE HUMBLE and discretion if the better part of valor! Always try to keep an open mind and always remember SOMEWHERE OUT THERE SOMEONE ELSE ALWAYS HAS A BIGGER BADDER BOAT!!

Best Regards,
Ray @ Raylar

Well put Ray. The big advantages of the LS platform are a very stable factory block and excellent flowing heads. If you want to compare a 454 LSX to a conventional 454 the LSX will kill it. If you compare a 427LSX to a conventional 588 with excellent flowing cylinder heads it's not a fair comparison. I understand why Skater 30 took offence to the comments but, from a design standpoint the standard BBC is a bit of a dinosaur. BBC guys would kill for the valve angles the LS runs. Really good aftermarket heads for older big and small blocks have really helped up the power in the last few years but a lot of them still barely flow as well as sub $1000 factory LS offerings. As the displacement in the LS engines continue to grow so will the NA power output. In the meantime there is boost. With killer cylinder heads and stout bottom ends this is where the LS really shines. With direct injection and marine turbo kits right around the corner anyone who is ignoring the LS platform will be left in the dust. There will always be a place for the BBC, they are fairly cheap and easy to build, and they too keep growing in cubes. In one of the cars I crew on we're finally upgrading from a tiny 615 to a moderately sized 833..

Want to talk displacment , a friend used to build a 904 cubic inch drag race motor ,crazy horsepower ,now I imagine they are @ 1000 ci in these monsters.

I wish I had such an "extremely slow" boat.

Michael

buy it then. everything is fur sale