I have been kicking around the idea of upgrading the power plants in my 29 Outlaw. Right now I got 496Mags. I have 2 thoughts and would love some advice. First thought was to rebuild the 496Mags with good internal parts and put Whipples on the motors. My other thought is to replace the motors with something like 525EFI's. If i were to do that is there used ones out there and would I be able to sell the 496's. They have 350Hrs and nothing wrong with them.

I've looked into this same thing, it's really a wash either way and both ways are pricey. If I was to do it I would go whipple, but the 525's will be better when it comes time to sell. I've just come to terms with it being slow. The one thing I might do is make them ho's. That will put it in the mid 70's and make it sound better at least.

http://www.offshoreonly.com/forums/s...urs-clean.html

http://www.raylarengineering.com/496...nce-parts.html

Buy a different boat. You will be so Upside down not worth it. My .02

yea got to agree its always fun to think about upgrades but they always cost more than you think they will and in the end you lose money on it unless the boat is your forever boat i would sell it when you can get the right price then look for a deal over the winter with cash in hand

if your going to keep the boat for a long time, build what you want, but if you dont have 30-40K to dunp into this, just leave em alone, and yes blue power will be best on resale

One of our local owners who recently sold and moved tweaked his 29 a couple of years ago.
I'd suggest working with the power you have with minimal performance upgrades, finding the sweet of trim and drive height, then working on props.
It worked for Hossman and he was pushing the 80mph mark, or look for another boat.

I'm curious, what do 29OL's running stock 496's see for top end speed?

See ya,
Kelly

All great advice.

Something else to consider if you're not going to be the one doing the rebuild is that many marine engine shops are usually not in any particular hurry when it comes to that kind of work and even more so when you ship the engine far away. The plus to buying blue engines, assuming they are 100%, you can just drop them in and run. The plus to rebuilding what you have from the crank out is you'll get a solid engine with strong internals that could, depending on the set up, yield more horsepower.

Something else to consider with the 496, if the shop does not have the ability to tune the 555 right their on-site the tune will not be right, take if from me. I am sure the Raylar kit ECM will work fine, but if you go with just your basic engine shop they'll most likely not have the capabilities. If you don't want to go with the Raylar kit and do a rebuild I would suggest researching and contacting Precision Marine in Kenner, LA. They have the abilities to tune the 555 and whatever future work I am going to do to our 496 they will be the guys to do it.

http://www.pmefi.com/Precision_Marin...e_Engines.html

Either way it will not be cheap and most likely during the process it will not be fun.

Hossmans had ho's. The mag boats like ours are 70-72.