Hydraulic Steering
 

What brand is the best for a add on system. bravo 1 out drive.

Also what are the differences between systems besides price?

No one has any insight they could share? The two i am considering are imco and Mayfair. I would like to order this in the morning but would really appreciate it if someone will give me some thoughts on these two brands.

IMCO makes an excellent system. I use their stuff on 95% of the jobs I do. I have used the Mayfair also. Hardin Marine is making it I believe. I like their system for an add on because of price. Their add on kit is considerably less than IMCO and it gets the job done just fine. Haven't had the first bit of trouble from either system, and I have installed PLENTY of both. You can't go wrong with either. Good luck and let me know if I can help. I am a dealer for both. Hope this helps, Eddie.

Forgot to mention........
Mayfiar is getting away from the rear cap steering mount. They are using a wing plate. I don't care for the wing plate since it gets in the way when removing and servicing the drive. They are doing it since new Merc drives could have the warranty void if you remove the rear cap to install the new one. Ridiculous.....I know. But that's Merc for you. The wing plate has also raised the price. I like the rear cap that IMCO uses. I think it makes a very clean install.
Eddie

I have used both. I used a single ram Mayfair on my 18. They had a cool polished SS bracket. If they still had that setup it would be a slam dunk. As Eddie said, they have gone to a wingplate as have most. It is about $300 more but not a bad deal.

I recently used an INCM trim ram full external on my big donzi. It is a nice product.

I spoke with Hardin today and they informed me of a new wingplate design they have just released. The new wingplate is a cast(not fabricated) modular design. It not only mounts to the drive studs but it also mounts to the rear cap bolts. It is able to stay on the drive when the drive is removed, since it is attached to the rear cap. It is also able to come apart if needed. This will eliminate the need to remove the wingplate to remove the drive. I really like that since you don't take a chance of scratching the drive. They also have a drive shower that is made to mount with the wingplate, so you have a matching set engineered to work together.
On top of that, the price has not changed. It is back at the original price of the kit when it had the rear cap mount. That puts the complete full hydraulic kit far cheaper than the IMCO. It is around $3300 for the full hydraulic set up.
They are going to send a pic to me. I will post it as soon as I get it. Hope this helps, Eddie.

Here is a pic of the Mayfair single ram add on I installed a couple of months ago. There is a clearance issue with the swim platform on my Nordic but nothing that can taken care of.
Attachment 352644

We can get you most any of the good systems on the market. Just sold the new set up to a customer in Germany, had to wait until the new plates were fabricated. Worth the wait. they are real nice pieces.

Email us [email protected]

Kirk

Hey thanks guys for the help!!! I ended up going with the Mayfair

Good choice.

Here are some pictures of the new system, thanks for the support Eddie.

Feel free to ask any questions that you may have, these kits are now on the shelf and ready to ship.

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...e/MAYFAIR1.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...e/MAYFAIR2.jpg

That's a sharp set up. That eliminates all of the things that I didn't like about a wingplate. Sorry for the confusion.

Eddie

That is a nice looking system.

I really liked the stainless end cap on the Mayfair but that setup is a great answer to the wingplate solution.

There are a lot of good systems out there. But, IMO skip the add-on and go all out and do the full system.

I did hear good things about thhe XS Performance system and it was priced very reasonably.

http://www.xsperformancemarine.biz/page3.html

Mayfair does have a very nice kit.

Remember we can get all CP Performance products at a very nice prices to you.

[email protected]

Kirk

I have a brand new Zeiger Twin ram, single drive, Full system that I will let go cheap. If someone is interested, pm me to discuss.

The Zeiger kits are really nice too.

ThruHull

How much do you want for your kit?

Greg

pm sent

What's the difference between single and dual ram? Obviously dual would be more robust, but how much does it matter? Is it a performance thing or just reliability? Will you see a difference at 60mph? 80?

My .02, If budget is a concern, I would rather have a single ram, FULL system over a dual ram add-on. The helm unit is what really makes the diff. On a smaller, single engine boat of course.