This year I put 40 hours on my boat. This is my first boat. I've learned a lot. I think am ready to move up to the next level of boat. I was thinking a 36 ft Outlaw. I will never have the monsters you all have. As much as I would like to think so. It's out of my reach. How do ya know when u are ready to have twin engines? How do ya know when u are ready to go faster than 65? I don't have boat friends. So I can't try faster boats.

Thank you
Mark

To go from a single to twins is easy. If you feel you are good with the single you will be fine. The biggest thing to get used to is the langth diffrentce. I went from a 27 to a 33 and it was a big difference. For the speed only puch the sticks as far as you are ready for work up to putting them to the dash. Learn the boat first because if you don't it could bite you in the as s... good luck

If you have the money then your ready. I went from a 25ft single to a 40ft twin. I never drove it until it was delivered to mt local boat ramp. The night before I went on utoob to learn how to navigate a twin, so much easier than a single. One thing you need to keep in mind is that a larger boat is harder to stop and takes longer to come to a halt. Good luck.

+1 on larger boat harder to stop x2$ on maintaining or doing any upgrades having 2 drivelines . Longer bow in front of me only really seems to bother me most at night when looking for other boats. When I had my 30 I felt like I could see the water right in front of me with my 38 feels like I'm looking a mile ahead and still can't see at night. Rough water capability is no comparison the 38 eats rough stuff for breakfast and asks for more. All said and done I wouldn't go back unless my budget made me.

I've personally did the 5 year rule, 40 hrs in my opinion is not much at all, I recently stepped up from a 25 to a 32, twins is def better, but sitting at around 35 hrs seat time this summer, I'd hardly consider myself a master at knowing my boat inside and out, it takes time, not all situations you could encounter will occur immediately, and I strongly disagree with the above statement when you can afford it your ready, you can't buy experience and know how, the speeds increase, reaction time needs to increase, closing in on on other boat increases, it's easy to get over confident in a bigger boat, you might be ok, but what about everyone else you share the water with? Not busting anyone's chops but this has been a tragic year for the go fast community and those folks by no means we're novice boaters

To start, a 36 Outlaw is a nice boat, know several guys that have them and they are very happy.

Try going to some boating events / gatherings, talk to people who have boats like that which you are interested in. You might find a good guy that says hop in, I'll take you for a rip! It can happen, I have done it more than once. Real performance boaters just can not wait to show off their chit !

Just remember bigger boat =bigger headaches =bigger $.

The step up is easy. You need to be sensible and a little disciplined to drive within your limits no matter how much the boat is screaming "push me harder". Do you drive your car at it's maximum speed? Boats are no different in that respect yet somehow, we all want to go flat out.

I read an article many years ago when Reggie Fountain, along with a boating writer, tested a 10m and the writer got it up to 104mph with a bit of help from Reggie. Reggie referred to "decisions per minute" and how the number of dpm's increase exponentially with speed. The difference between 60 and 70 is significant but the difference between 70 and 80 is huge.

You're already into the sixties in a smaller boat, that's pretty quick on water. If you're sensible out in the open, the hardest part will be learning to dock with twins. It's actually a lot easier than a single but takes a while to master. My golden rules for docking are....

Practice alone, no music, or friends to distract you.
If you're in trouble, pull away from the dock, take a breather, start again when you're heart beat is back to normal.
Learn to manouver with the gearshifts and leave the steering straight.
Come in against the wind, you can use the wind to stop you, especially the bow turning when backing in.
Always manouver at the slowest possible speeds, preferably idle, and just 'bump' one throttle as needed.

There's nothing hard to do as long as you are happy to learn, just like you did on your current boat.

Good luck!
RR

P.S. As already said, don't forget all your bills are about to go through the roof. Service, insurance, fuel etc, etc.