I have a 88 240 and I have often thought about pulling the big block glassing in the transom and putting 2 280s on it..is there any out there that have done this or know of any?

I know its not a 24', but here's a 220 Sport Ive seen the past few days on EBAY that I thought was interesting.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/86-Ba...item2eb779da88

It seems like I remember we built one with twin 200's or something and it ran like ****. Not enough weight at the back of the boat, and it ran on its nose. Now with todays heavy 4 strokes ????? Who knows....

XT

a ton of set back. There is a cottage industry down here of converting I/O's to O/B's.
They all will work w/enough testing to get set back right.
There's a Checkmate dealer down here w/a new 21' (full interior standard, family boat!) w/a 300XS on it running over 96 MPH's and a 24 over 90!!
Check the pix's of his boats though and look how far back the motors are.
Back in the '80's a lot of mfgs tried it and failed and 99% of the time that was the issue. 25' Checkmates were one and the 28's were worse. Absolute pigs w/o 3' or more of set back assuming twins and not triples.
I've been looking at the older 25' Baja's and thinking similar. W/what I have in my 24' Sonic restoration I could have done it.
Neat thing is the I/O boats had flat transoms so you get the sun lounge and all the storage where the chunk used to be and no splash well like the O/B's had.
I figure for about $10K I could have bought a really clean (late '80's w/dead or no power) 25' Baja or Checkmate, sold the drive train (re-coop 1/2 my investment) , beef up the transom and screw on motors.
Never seen it done to a Baja either.

Ya I mean two 280s on a 2ft setback would have more weight transfer then a big block tucked down in the back of the boat..

XT-
Do you remember the Baja factory race boat that ran GLOBRA in the mid to late 80s? It was a 30' with dual Mariner OBs. For some reason I think it was called Magnum....could be wrong though.
SCT

that knows the Mate's Whats happening Shannon??
Every time I think back on my project, I wish I'd have bought one of the clean 25' GTX's I've seen and done a conversion.
Was one on e-bay recently that was a show piece. Think it sold for $14ish and ran perfect.
Whats a virgin 454 and Bravo w/all rigging worth?? $6 or $7K ???
Screw on a bracket and start rigging.
Still may be my next project. Really hate the liner in my Sonic among other things. And the lines of those boats were second to none.

Shannon,

I think your right, but that was a long time ago now.

I just remember the one 24 Sport with twins, and John Sauslen's 280 Force hull with a converted flat deck w/twin OB's. He raced in GLOPRA one year with the OB power, then converted it to I/O's. There was also a 320 with 3.4 L power that was built but I don't remember any details on it.

XT

hay i race a guy that had a 300hp on the back work the motor it ran 58mph maybe 60on a good day that was the only one i saw

Was just going to post about pix's. Never seen one before and I grew up there going through Bucyrus every weekend on the way to the big lake for my entire life. The one in the pix's looks to be riding good for a O/B.
Of course your comment about weight would apply here w/the 3.4's.
That boat would work in todays market w/about a 3' bracket/platform. I really like it. Both of my Sonics started w/the old Gil bracket and
I switched to platform style. Just having the platform was maybe the nicest addition to the whole rig.
Way cool. Thnx for the history lesson.
PS, here's one for you.Baja Catalog circa 1974 @ Cedar Point for '75 catalog. I was 14 yrs old and standing just out of view.