Ok, so a few weeks ago the Sea Ray dealer I have been going to since I was child had its yearly open house. I was in attendance for a couple reasons. I wanted to meet my parents there to give them my opinion on upgrading their boat (2006 260 DA) to a 31' Sundancer. The main reason though to see the new Pachanga. Below is my opinion. If you are looking for a quick summary, let’s just say there is a reason I waited almost two weeks to write this.

First off, this is a big 22' boat. It has quite a bit of freeboard, especially for a boat that is supposed to be a performance model. It’s wide too. The 8'4" beam looks huge in person. Climbing on board, the cockpit is pretty nice at first glance. The seating is nice, the gauges look good, and the switch gear has an upscale feel to it. That freeboard comes in handy, as you feel very secure in the boat. The rear bench is nice, and I especially like the molded in "step" that the side rear passengers can brace there feet on. The cabin is very large as well, with a good amount of head room and plenty of space to stretch out. The boat comes on a very nice trailer as well.

Well, that’s about all I had for nice things to say. First off, regardless if the drivers seat is flipped up or down, the boat feels awkward. It’s like it cant decide if it wants to be a sit down or stand up go fast boat. Once "comfortable" in the driver’s seat, it is APPAULING how cheap some of this boat is. The side panels in the cockpit are held on by tabs that slide behind the cockpit liner, and no less than three panels were already falling off. I tried to fix one, but it would not stay put once slid back into place. The drivers seat moves forward and back and swivels, but it can not rotate very far before it comes into contact with the side of the cockpit. It allows so little rotation its a wonder why they even bothered. Once in the cabin, you stumble across these little dual cup holder pods that have a tab you can wedge in between cushions. This allows different placement locations. To me, it screams after-thought. The deck is completely void of non-skid, which is fine considering it’s a performance boat. But there is not even a grab rail down the center. Given the size of this boat ad being around boating my whole life, at some point someone is going to have to venture onto that deck. I would fear that situation. Also, do spring-loaded pop up cleats exist anymore? The ones on this boat were not spring loaded ad were free to just flop around. The sound of them banging around in rough water would annoy the crap out of me, as if a liner boat didnt already sound like a bucket full of rocks every time it lands off a wave.

All of those issues were regarding ergonomics and layout. What about the performance side of things? Well first off, the rear hatch design is pretty neat. The lower bench pivots forward, and allows access to a latch that unlocks the sun pad. The sunpad/engine cover then swings open with the assist of gas-filled struts. It all goes down hill from there. The engine looks like it was rigged by a 5 year old. Granted comparing a mass produced boat to a custom boat like a Pantera is not exactly fair, but this was unacceptable. With the way the bench seat is and the fiberglass "shoulders" that the sun pad rests on, working on this thing is going to be a pain. Move to the outside of the boat, the hull is nothing too crazy in terms of design. It has a low x dimension, that’s for sure. The saddest part about the hull is the swim platform. It’s a nice platform, but it’s literally built on top of another tiny platform. Nothing is sealed off; no attempt was made to streamline this. Anyone that has been around boating knows the gap between the two will impossible to keep clean, and a pain in the ass to wash and wax. It looks cheap and tacked on, period. Also, any doubt that this is a Baja hull is gone when you see the typical vin tag on the SIDE of the hull. I won’t even go into how stupid a Bravo III drive is on this type of boat.

There were other issues that I saw as well. Trim / plastic cap material on fiberglass edges that was far from straight, gaps missing, and glue seeping from many edges was just one example. I guess I could classify most of the other things as poor fit and finish. One amusing thing was the warning on the dash explaining speeds over 45 mph would result in reduced maneuverability. I’m going to doubt this thing will handle like the previous P22.

In the end you could consider some of my things as nit-picky. So the trim is a bit funky. So the cockpit panels need to be adjusted or snapped back in constantly. So the rigging is not professional. For $104,000 MSRP, I cannot over look those though. Perhaps if the boat was more reasonably priced, yes. But that boat did not exhibit six figure build quality, not even close. As an aside, the dealer had it marked down to a show special $89,900.

I’m sure at this point your wondering where the pictures are. I didn’t take any. I brought two digital cameras, and didn’t use a single one. That’s how disappointing this boat truly is. They created a sub par product at an inflated price. It’s interesting to note the comments the dealer made. I asked about the black and yellow hulls after the first 100, and they said don’t count on more than the 100 red anniversary editions being built. In fact, they said total production might not even reach 100. I guess I am not the only one that has been disappointed by the results. If they wanted to do a short run boat that commemorated their 50th anniversary, they should have just used the 1980's molds. I would have dropped the cash immediately to secure one. I will never drop cash on this warmed over Baja. If a Pachanga enthusiast site can’t even generate interest (last post in the 2009 P22 forum before this was February 17th), I’m not sure who will be buying. Sorry Sea Ray…