Outdrive Replacement - 1998, 290 DA, 5.0L

Hi Folks.

Maintenance time is coming up quickly and I need some honest feed back.

My outdrives are functioning great but look like a shark has gnawed on them and I broke a cavitation plate on one of them. No leaks, no whine and they shift pretty good. In looking at 7 years of maintenance records before buying the boat it only notes that one lower unit housing was replaced due to a crack.

With that said. The boat is going to be pulled to replace one of the transoms and to redo all boots and seals on both drives since they were noted on my PPI as being at the end of their life.

Quite a bit of the labor is in the boot and seal replacement so the only labor included below is putting the drives together if I go with SEI.

1) Perform an outdrive maintenance and use current drives until they are dead mechanically.

2) Replace them with OE drives (marina suggestion) $6500 Installed

3) Replace then with SEI 116 drives (marina did not like) $4000-4500 Installed

So lets talk warranty. Go with OE drives there's a 12 month warranty and hull out is included if anything happens. If I go with SEI they have a 3 year warranty and hull out is not included if anything breaks and the boat has to come out.

So to save $2000-2500 is it worth going with SEI?

Again open to hear all positives and negatives.

The bellows work is not going to be lost if you don't replace the drives now, so if the issues with your drives are purely cosmetic at this point, I might run them until one quits. As far as replacing them, I would go with the SEI drives - I could not justify a new OEM drive on a 20yr old boat. But, I am DIY, so swapping the drives would be my free labor and it would be on me if I had a warranty issue with SEI. In your case if you are relying on your marina and they are charging you the haulout and labor if you had an SEI warranty issue, the savings might go away pretty quick. Plus you would probably get a little I told you so attitude from them. But I still think I would go with SEI and just deal with any issues if and when they happen.

My opionion, if the corrosion isn’t causing any issues just prep, paint, and go boating. Like Bill said the work you’re doing now won’t be lost if you replace them later.

I have had issues with SEI on our boat that I documented in other threads, but I can go into detail if you want. I’ve had good luck since replacing both under warranty though so maybe I got unlucky.

FWIW I'm on the 5th year with my SEI drive and I have had zero issues and I have it connected to a 383 Stroker motor estimated to have between 325-350 HP. However, I don't dump the throttle and I don't jump wakes. I don't baby it but I don't beat it either. If you go with e SEI I think you'll be fine.

Just remember.... There is never time, or money, to do it right but always time, and money, to do it over.
Shawn