Anyone ever heard of Commander Marine Engines? I know of a pair of 460's for sale that I might buy for a project. The motors have Velvet drives on them as they came out of an inboard cruiser. What are the chances that I could remove the Velvet drives, add bellhousings and mate them to a Mercrusier bravo drive transom assembly?

Thoughts other than I'm crazy are appreciated.

omc used ford 460s with their king cobra outdrives.if you got the coupler they used it should bolt up to their ford flywheel,then get a bravo bellhousing and you should be golden.

Yes Commander was installed in alot of inboard ski boats more so than cruiser apps thru out the 80's and very early 90's. What I remember the most was about the 5.8 having warped heads and exhaust manifolds flange area alot. But alot of that basically was from owners not keeping up with their cooling systems.

if they are in fact 460 fords, they work better on the other end of the boat...

The Ford to Bravo Bellhousing is going to be the tough part. I know a guy that redrills Chevy bellhousings for big block Mopars, but not Fords.

murfman,you are correct.maybe the omc bell housing could be altered to work.i think it will work if he uses a omc inner transom plate,i am pretty sure the bolt holes are the same as a bravo transom assembly.

Just adding info on top of - OMC cobra transom assembly will not cross over / install conversion over to a Mercruiser Bravo transom assembly. The cutout is different

Unless the 460's are free you will probably be ahead of the game if you just look for and buy a Chevy engine.. Don't buy the 460's to couple to a Bravo unless you are a glutton for punishment ...my opinion

BBF and SBF the same bellhousing?? The merc188 was popular centuries ago, its a 302 ford

I don't know or care much about difference between bellhousings on big and small ford.But..I am pretty sure back when Merc did use fords (I think 76 or so was last year)the bellhousing to transom plate mounts had a different spacing than any of the newer stuff