Stock price on Konrads are 26k an-a-bit.

Guess that was not mentioned..

Rik,

First off, I am not talking bad about your stuff. I said it before and I will say it now you make a great product and I would love to build a new boat rigged with Arnesons. I spoke with you a few times about my boat and we had a real nice talk in Key West a couple of years ago in Team 26 pit area.

I did an apples to apples search and the costs I posted are real numbers. Nobody pays list price.
I priced out everything and was actually quoted prices cheaper than I posted for the IMCO's and Konrads (those were all I could find with a quick search today). All I did was point out options based on their prices (there are other options besides Arneson). There is a huge difference in price between an upgraded Bravo style and a "conversion". If you want to add Konrad to a conversion that is fine.
Bottom line for me was the final cost of the conversion to Arnesons was going to cost me just under $60,000. Konrads were going to be around $40,000. The IMCO set up complete was under $20,000. Those prices included getting money back from selling my old drives.
If I had a bigger budget, I may have gone for the Arnesons but at almost half the value of the boat, maybe I would look at a newer or different boat.
Just my input from months of research for my application.

-Tom

Tom, I know this. I just want everyone to have clarity when a "special inventory reduction price" is shown that it doesn't get misconstrued as once it is on the internet it stays forever, right or wrong. As far as speed you know also there is no comparison so I do not feel there is a choice between the two.

As for cost, yest it is without argument less expensive to change a portion of an existing drive than to swap drives completely. But in doing so there is no penalty between the swaps. Pulling the motors and changing the drives is a equal cost nearly across the board for any drive. If this or any boat needed complete drives the cost would be lower with the Arnesons.

I think that price is for the regular sc not the scx..?

Frank, listen Smitty, he has a ton of bravo knowledge and has tried about everything. I think you've heard that last bit of advise before as well.

Also, to your point, you have to think about resale and getting in too deep into a boat. It doesn't take long to throw $25k into engine rebuilds, $10k into exhaust, $5k or $10k into fixing a drive or two before deciding to upgrade to better drives at the cost of another $30k, oh and then you need a set of ssm props at a cost of $5k+ if you really upgrade to pullet proof drives, then another few grand into fixing odds and ends, etc. Before you know it you're in pretty deep so I agree that you need to be realistic on what you put into upgrades. It's nice to have all fresh and bulletproof stuff, but you don't want to have to be berried in it either!

It's real easy for some folks to say you absolutely need Arnesons, x power, a full SCX setup, etc, all with ssm props, but that's not an easy check to write. In some cases it's far cheaper to just sell the boat and buy something with better drives... so Adam said he'll give you $50k for the boat to put you out of your misery!


BTW, if it were me knowing that it will likely be the upper ring gear that will be failing, I'd set aside a few dollars and wait for a nice set of late model Bmax's to show up on the used market, be ready to pull the trigger when they do. The lowers tend to last longer than the uppers so I don't think you'll go through many of those... plus those are cheaper as well if you do happen to eat one or two going forward.

You can buy 2 Bmax's and HP transoms for 30K so if I read your statement correct you can match that with Arnesons?

We spoke about this years ago. Sorry, I was wrong about the up vs. down. My oil pans already had clearance issues as they were setup back then and I couldn't go down any further. There were other considerations I had with little kids and cleaver props.

Bravo style props are roughly 1/2 - 1/3 the cost of SSM props if were talking merc props from what I've found.

You have a great system, I'm not knocking it. It just wasn't feasible for me to consider back then. I hope you understand it was nothing against you or product. It just wasn't the right fit for me and my needs.

I had the same issues with Bravo's on my Apache. I kept blowing uppers. The Bmax solved my problems in that area. I've never had any lower failures.

I've seen quite a few lower failures and was under the impression with decent driving/throttling and service intervals the uppers had a decent chance at living, especially if a good top cap and drive shower were used. How many hours are the uppers giving out at? What happens? Teeth wear down? Break off?