funny a guy came up to me yesterday and asked “is that boat ever done”?
Nah....

Yeah used is a good idea, there seems to be a few always available. I’ve got my eye on doing a fast magnum or sunseeker but I’m leery of the costs, complexity and duration of the project spiraling out of control.

No kidding. Wrapped the transom in a navy blue metallic yesterday. Tomorrow, recovering the small ceiling panels right when you walk into the rear bed room and the small one at the head of the bed. OH.......and the toilet pump started to run non stop again after I replaced every component sans the pressure tank and the line from the toilet to the vacuum tank. Good thing the wife is out of town for a week so I get to work on the boat, go to the range to shoot stuff, hit the local sprint car track and a new friend introduced me to KartCross............I need one of those like a hole in the head. He has two racers and I think im hooked.

Update - Unfortunately, it looks like I'm going the vanilla route. The issue wasn't budget, but after talking to various shops and having everyone of them try to talk me out of it, I gave in. I'm going to freshen the 502's top ends and convert the Bravo 3's over to Bravo 1 x's. The shop I'm using has converted 2 45 Excalibur's over to the Bravo 1x's with great results. I'm also going to add the big K-tabs, the plates on there now are nearly worthless. This boat is a day cruiser and on fresh motors it should cruise between 38-40 and do 50+ at WOT. I'm good with that.

I would NOT put a Bravo 1x on this boat. You will be disappointed in overall performance. Before putting Arnesons on mine I ran the Bravo 3 at a 2.0 ratio. In doing that you can use the Bravo XR gear set in the upper. Much stronger. If your Bravo case doesnt have a tower in it you can have MAX Machine worx install one or just buy new upper Bravo XR upper case with gears and install your Bravo 3 lover to it. I ran 700hp (60mph) on this set up for years. I changed the gears every season due to load wear not breakage.

A 400 Ss formula is much smaller than the Excalibur, and they eat drives. Sonic 30 wasted a bunch of drives in a couple short seasons. Proof enough to me that bravos are a horrible idea on that boat.

I hear ya... I'll go back and talk to the shop again. The work isn't schedule until December.

Let me ask this, I run this boat on The Lake of the Ozarks, it handles the big water great, but I need it to be able to maneuver in some tight spaces and slips. I store the boat at my dock on a back-up lift. I hear Arneson drives really make it hard to drive at low speeds. True?

Also, what surface drives would you recommend?

The boat handles and drives better with the Arneson vs the Bravo. Docking was way better with the Arneson I put the Arneson 7M on mine same as Sonic30 is doing on his. But that is a project to install correctly and will cost some money. My advise is to build Bravo 3XR drives and change the fluid every 15-20 hrs is your staying with stock horsepower.

Arneson ASD #8 surface drive is what we use on 42', 20,000 lb, Cigarette type hull with Cat 3126/420HP Diesels. For that hull u might need more HP but the ASD #8, can handle lots more. Highly recommend this set up. We have many years on the drivetrain near flawless performance.. Always get 1 KMPG or more. Very
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