ah so you were teh guy who bought it!!!!!

i forgot abotu it and checked it abotu 5 miniutes after it closed...

Puder
No I did not buy the one on e-bay. I e-mail him and he said he had two units. So I got the other one

MikeW

I bought my Pantera in early Jan., so I haven't spent too much time with it. But.
The boat has twin Bravos, with Marine Machine dual ram steering.
It has the MM full Hydraulic helm.
There is no stock Merc steering arm.
Both 502MPIs have steering pumps. Why? You'd think one is enough. I haven't traced the lines to see how everything is hooked up..

Any external system is better than the stock stuff.
Your upper 60s boat doesn't neeeed dual rams. It's a light boat, and doesn't run too hard. Don't waste your cash on the big system. Just get a single ram for less than 2k. Word has it that the system on my boat was 7500!!

This boat steers very well. You can take your hands off the wheel at 70 in the rough without any wander at all.
The only negative is the turning radius. those arms dont let the drive swing as far to the turn side. Yes you will notice a difference.

There is another system on e-bay. Single ram used but for $500.00 it my be worth a closer look...
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...category=31283
MikeW

TimG
Alot of boat manufactures when installing motors will not remove the power steering pump on one of the motors in a twin motor set up during assembly. When a boat manufacture recieves a motor from mercury it comes complete ready to install in the boat including the power steering pump. So one of the pumps on your motors is doing nothing. I found this out many years ago when I purchased a new boat and a few times out it needed a new pump. I went to the dealer and they did not have one, so being a good dealer they went out and took a pump off one of the motors of a new Champion chase with twins. Thats how I discovered this bit of information.

If you've got two pumps, do yourself and your passengers a big safety favor and get the Merc priority valve kit and hook them both up.
You are not safe from from a hard turn just because you have external steering and only one pressure source. If the engine with the PS pump on a twin fails at speed, especially if airborne or in a turn, you're in for a very exciting if not dangerous event.
(speaking from experience!)

Jafo,
Your exactly right about the pump failing. On a full hydrualic system when the pump source stops the drives stay exactly where the helm last turned the drives. You can spin the wheel in any direction and nothing happens , just like when the engine is off. On a partial set up, thats where the stock cable and rack steering are used, if the pump stops you can still steer, it is just very hard to turn the wheel.

Well Im sold on the half system now , with that said,
I dont expect to see anything over 70mph at least
anytime soon

I thought that there was a bypass valve on those helms so that you could still turn even if the engine went down. That would SUCK to blow a engine way off shore and not be able to get home!!!!!.

Jon

Are you sure ??? Has this happened to you ???