I have seen various posts about XR drives having reliability issues. Have found other posts on this topic, but they seemed to wander off and didnt get to any specific facts. Does anyone know (specifically) if Mercury Racing done anything in recent years to further strengthen the XR's or address any confirmed weaknesses?

I recently had a new Hustler Talon 25 built with a 565, XR sportmaster w/ITS..... So when I see these posts about XRs breaking, it gives me heartburn.

Theres hundreds of threads here about the XR bravo based drives. Push them hard, they will break, especially if you boat in rough water. The drive guardians are a good idea.

pretty much the same drive it would be nice if they would build a stronger unit

I just did some preventative maintenance on my Bravo XR drives as I just hit the 280 hour mark and wanted to pull them apart and check them out in the hopes of not blowing them up. On all three drives, I had to replace bearings, gears and pinions. Based on my mechanics opinion, he felt I would very likely not get through the season without at least one of them blowing up. Those three drives have been pushing a 16,000 boat with many hours in ocean conditions. IMO, close to 300 hours without incident is pretty good. Glad I did the maintenance though and spared the headache of blowing up a drive mid season.

No.

Uncle Dave

on 565 hp you should have no problem with an XR drive' , just remember thats these out drives are not meant for whole shots from a dead stop and of course pulling throttles back in the air will help make them live , I had about 100 hours on my 600 ci 750 hp motor with a XR drive that was ocean ran hard with no problems , so 565 hp should be easy on that drive , It mostly on how you drive and maintain the drive

NO sorry bud mercury racing has done nothing besides profit off the failures

They are actually less reliable and it's sad they can't even last as long as the engine's they are behind. Shoot there's even an alarming number of stock 496 family boats prematurely breaking bravo, bravo X, XZ, and XR drives.

Just drive her and enjoy, refresh and rebuild as necessary

No point driving your High Performance boat like a grandma

ONLY thing you can do is scheduled maintenance which includes removing, inspection, and rebuild as necessary.

What you do have going for you is that it is on a moderately small boat that will not be launching off of 4 footers.

Agree, plus it's an efficient cat hull

Down side is high X dimemsion and 5 blade prop cause extra stress

Don't worry just enjoy your new boat! Congrats by the way! And just think of it as normal boating expense

Congrats on a great boat purchase! Drive the snot out of it for the next 3 years trouble free maybe. Then rebuild the engine with a supercharger and scrap the XR drive for an IMCO SCX, no worries. Sounds like a great 5 year plan! Isn't boating fun and expensive.