I have a Skater 32B and I removed the Arneson ASD 7's for Dry Sump M6 last winter. The boat has two normally aspirated 598Cu tall decks. The power is awesome and reliable and can easily run circles around 450's on this same boat. The acceleration is nuts and the motors turn 3700 RPM's at 90 mph and top out at 5450. I am spinning 18x33's through a 1:1.15 gear ratio. Here are my issues: 1. My neighbors had enough of the noise. I live in a very conservative area to say the least. 2. Fuel consumption is probably 1.2-1.4 miles per gallon. 3. Since the acceleration and noise are like driving in a pro street car, my girl is scared and uncomfortable to say the least. I frequently find myself not wanting to take this boat out not to disturb the neighborhood. Another issue is we are in NJ and Barnegat Bay is very rough especially on Saturday and Sunday. Yes, we can run some good top speed no issue and stay there. I run out of boat. This boat is too small to enjoy the power. In my eyes the 32B is an excellent candidate for outboards size wise. My buddy bought the 2005 Skater 400R 32B and my neighbors are smiling, waving and thumbs up complimenting. The boat runs 107-110 every day and he is getting 2 miles to gallon plus. He does have to run wide open to my cruise RPM.

So last week I purchased two 400R's with low hours. I know I wont get my money back on 450's on this boat. I am going to re rig this boat again with the 400s. I am going to park one set of M6's and transoms with Wilson lowers since I have 4 transoms and 4 drives. I am going to look for a 368 or 39 MTI if I decide to go inboard for my next boat. Who knows I may like the outboards. That 38 Doug Wright with 450s seems interesting. I can sell this boat with a warranty etc which is the other problem for the inboards. The market collapsed. I do agree the technology will have 500's or 550 outboards coming. If they make the prop shafts and dual down shafts the price will be nuts but will be very nice.

I have thought about this for a few years now, and have come to the conclusion that like many of us I do my own Maintenance and repairs/rebuilds. I have always had inboard boats with somewhat large HP engines, nothing exotic. But every year that goes bye I can't seem to bend, stretch, contort, and stand on my head in the bilge as I used to and my guess is it's most likely not going to get easier, my mind is made up that in a few short years 3-4 I will have to get me an outboard rig, for the warranty and general ease of use.. It will have to be used so you guys take good care of you stuff for me! My choice would be a 368 Skater with 450s or by that time bigger power!

The outboards are the sensible smart decision. Since I don’t care to be either of those with my performance boats give me the 700’s in my DCB and the outboards on my wife’s toon.

Exactly why I went to a cc. My knees and back are worn out - can't crawl all over these dam boats anymore! lol

It's cool to come back to this thread and see all the wide-ranging viewpoints. None of them are wrong, as they all make valid cases for wanting to own one setup vs the other. For me, I wanted back what I missed about my inboard setup - the 100mph and up performance, the ride quality of the heavier/more balanced CG (my 30 with naturally aspirated/single carb motors and ASD7s was actually quite well balanced) and the look/sound/coolness of the big block inboard setup. I often take newbies and clients for trips to the SF Bay, and bouncing around in my quiet outboard setup was not near as comfortable or impressive as my inboard setup was. My intent for the 700/36 I picked up is to have the reliability of an outboard rig, with the performance/ride quality of an inboard. I know I'm not going to quite reach the full extent of either, as I won't get near as many hours between rebuilds as a 450 rig, and I certainly won't have the performance of an 1100/1350 rig. I do expect to get 250 hours or so before I have to pull my motors again, and I don't think I'll have any issues with my fresh #6 drives or BAM 1500 transmissions. Performance will definitely exceed that of any 450 rig after the Whipple upgrades performed during the rebuilds. I'm crossing my fingers that my decision will work out well for me, and only time will tell. It's definitely a very cool time we are living in now that we are even able to have these discussions - who would've ever guessed 10 years ago that we would even be having this conversation now?

We had a DCB M31 with 700SCI's stage 3 Whipple up-grade prior to buying an O/B boat. The M31 was a very cool boat and the fit and finish of the DCB's is amazing . We moved to an MTI 340 with the 450's and have no regrets. We left the boat at Hualover in Miami last winter and had a blast with it. There is a huge difference to me going 100mph to 110mph for an hour straight and not stressing about getting things to hot, fuel, or hurting a motor. As others have mentioned, our 340 with 450's would out run our 700 boat 0-100, IMO. Most of our boating is 60mph to 110mph, so this set up is ideal for my family.

Cheers,

Bo

You're talking about running your 450's right ? No concern about the gearcases ? I can't imagine doing that with my 28 Skater and 300X's - maybe I'm paranoid about the gearcases tho …

MDS

Hope to catch up at the March MTI run sir.

yes sir, from Biscayne Bay all the way down to Gilberts is approximately 45 minutes to an hour. On smooth days will run between 90 and 110 the whole way down there with no issues. Then will turn around and come back at the same speeds. 👍🏼

Looking forward to it buddy. That’s my favorite boating event of the year. See you guys soon.