Makes since to me that loosing 300lbs out of engine bay will affect ride/handling characteristics in some way. 290PQ is a nice boat. Good luck.

Thank you for your reply. I will post a video hopefully before September whether its positive or negative.

So I just reread my original post and I can see where you would get the idea that I bought the aluminum stuff solely to reduce the chine walk. I had actually already purchased the stuff when I spoke with the engineer. Told him what I was doing and that I had had a problem with chine walk and that's when he commented that lowering the center of gravity may help.
My sincere apologies to bajaman and F2 Speedy. I was the "D". Not my first time.I was excited to talk to people about what I was doing and looking for input. I have burned the bridge at this site (and I am quite embarrassed) so I will look to other sites and start over and will absolutely: "get over yourself (myself) dude...and quit looking for insult when there was none. You'll get a lot more help when you loosen up."

I will however post the video of how the boat runs. Good or bad.

Its all good PQ I may of been a bit harsh in my wording and have deleted it, I certainly dont want to run off new members so good luck with your build

lol...we've all been there...me typically after too many Crown and Cokes and deciding to hop on the keyboard!

I think reducing the weight in the back has some merit for sure...as weight affect balance which can affect chine walking. It was interesting to note that other 290 owners had experienced a similar phenomena at about the 70 mph mark. Makes one wonder if there is simply something in the hull design? But then again that is big boat so..interesting.
In the past I would film my or other boats at speed to try and see if there was anything of interest. My 208 Baja literally was running with maybe 4' of the hull in the water at top speed...I swear you could see underneath it completely from time to time in the video...which made me completely understand why it was doing what it was doing.
You don't happen to have any vids of your boat running, by chance?

The 290 hull has always tended to chine walk at or above 70 mph. Your steering upgrade is the best thing you can do to combat that, and learning to balance a boat on the keel takes seat time.

Reducing weight may help as it may get a chine further out of the water, or if the boat is too heavy for the chines to hold up and is constantly falling off, like a pad bottom. the 290 is a big boat compared to most 29'ers, however two cast iron BBC in the back is still a ton of weight compared to its length. Probably why the 4-blade Bravos' helped out is because they lift the stern better than your old 3-blades. I still would be cautious adding big HP, more or less dumping a ton of money you wont recover, as that hull isn't known or utilized to go fast. If that hull does have built-in rocker on the bottom, having it removed would be the best bet. Even though you think it is above the water at speed, hit one wave not on center that hits the rocker on one side but not other, now that just put you into a chine walk.

I’m a big fan of the Powerquest 290. It’s a really big 29 foot boat as some people already mentioned. I think throwing HP at it is a good idea. You’ll have a boat that will surprise a lot of other go fast boats. We had a Checkmate 259 Convincor that would chine walk at WOT. We swapped the the 3 blade prop out for a 4 blade, added full hydraulic steering and HP tabs. We bumped the power up to 460HP from 385 and had a nice riding boat. Good luck with your upgrades, I think you’ll be happy with the finished product.

Engines
 

So I ended up not getting all of the parts in time to get the engines put back together and installed so I decided to take them in and have them redone top to bottom. They have over 700 hours on them and were in great shape. Not much wear and will be able to maintain the stock bore. I am however replacing pistons and connecting rods and bumping the compression up to 9.8. Hoping to get them back in October and then have the marina down the street install them back in the boat. I will be all winter trying to remember how everything goes back together along with where to put some new parts I bought. FYI, they are Gen V 7.4's.

What gear ratio are your drives? 50 @ 3500? That's impressive for that hull with only a 24 pitch. What HP are the current engines?

They are Bravo 1 and the ratio is 1.5. The RPM might be 3600 but the speed is with GPS. I can look through some of my vid's and see if I captured this.