I love our 496HOs. Regular maintenance is your friend just like any of our engines. A few dollars on oils etc can save thousands and keep rebuilds off of the to-do list. They are easy on fuel until 4500, IMO. The sonic is lighter and narrower so I can barely fit an arm between the bastards, pics of full staggered setups leave me jealous of the space.....and they usually have as much hp on one side as I have in both!

I did as much research as possible before purchasing and found tons of great reviews on the HO/B1X pkg. Good news for us both, no one said they broke their hull from them