A friend of mine is looking at a 30ft cat w/ 02 300 Pro Max's. Are these motors reliable? What is your opinion?

My boss has 2 on his cigarette and has had to do a bunch of stuff to them. Right now he is redoing a lower unit on one. And he does baby his stuff.

I'e had a few issues with the lowers also, turns out the shift shaft seal likes to pop out and allow sea water to enter the case. I went and had the lowers with the seal customized so the seal wont push out. Other then that they run like bandits, but remember they are racing motors and things will happen on motors being pushed to those tolerences. If you think those are moody try the 250x racing, and then you'll know why guys who run these have a mechanic on call.

I haven't had problems with my 98's other than my lower units. The 02's however are a totally different animal. They changed in 2001 to the X's. More HP and more problems from what I have heard.

In retrospect though..... What performance boat is low maintenance? or doesn't break down... Ya wanna play, ya gotta pay...

Amen to that!

I guess you here different things about everything. A guy local on the Potomac had a 26 AO cat w/twin 300 pro max's. This guy is hard on everything. He had over 400 hours, and according to a computer reading done 80% of the motors life was over 5000 rpm, the compression test also showed no signs of needing to be rebuilt. I have heard the 300 pro max's are a lot more reliable than the 300x motors but they are making 25-40 less HP.

All my issues have been with the lowers not the motors.

Yeah but that can get expensive. Believe me I have had to rebuild both of them. I do have to agree though that my problems have only been with the lowers too... And I have over 250 hrs on mine. Still going strong. Knock on wood...

Thanks for all the input.