290 sundancer with 4.3's ?

[Maggieiscrazy]

I've been looking at a couple 290 sundancers with 220hp 4.3 litre engines. How does that boat perform with those engines? What kind of fuel mileage does it get?

 

[Strecker25]

What year? The 1997.5 - 2001?

 

[Maggieiscrazy]

The one I'm really interested in is a 2006.

 

[Strecker25]

Ah ok, sorry I don't have any firsthand experience with those years. We have a 98, and with the 4.3's some folks complain about performance but our years were about 31' with a 10'3" beam and 10,500# dry. We have the 260HP 350's and the perform great, but we do alot of on plane cruising.

There's a bunch of people on here with the newer 290s that will chime in, check out their "official" thread too.

 

[Ididntdoit]

that boat was meant to replace the 01-08 280 but obviously never did.....it is the same size and weight......the 280 performs fine with the 4.3s and i bet the 290 will to.....the best advice is test one loaded as you intend to use it.......i really like those 06 07 290s.....took care of one of the 280s biggest shortcomings, not enough fuel capacity - i think the 290 holds another 25 gals

 

[bigblockcutlass]

I had a 1990 270 with 4.3s. Good power, but a friend had a 1997 270 witch is a little heavier, not enough or barley enough. I also run Mariage plus props witch helped a lot.

 

[mobocracy]

Ah ok, sorry I don't have any firsthand experience with those years. We have a 98, and with the 4.3's some folks complain about performance but our years were about 31' with a 10'3" beam and 10,500# dry. We have the 260HP 350's and the perform great, but we do alot of on plane cruising.

There's a bunch of people on here with the newer 290s that will chime in, check out their "official" thread too.

Are the under-performance complaints mostly about top-end planing speeds?

 

[btyman11]

I had an 01' 280 with twin 4.3's EFI 190hp each with Alpha 1 Gen 2s. They were fantastic motors. Plenty of power. I would imagine they are fine in the later model 290 as it basically replaced the 280.

 

[play dough]

I had an '89 300DA with 5.7L/Alphas and cruised with friends that had a '99 290DA with the 4.3L/Alpha drives. I cruised around 2900 RPM with the 5.7L and he was well over 4000 RPM to get the same speed. I would have preferred to run a little faster, but he couldn't keep up so I trimmed a little and went a bit slower. At the end of the day, our fuel consumption was similar with his usually being a little higher. He often commented that he would have preferred an 8 cylinder motor in that boat.

 

[Strecker25]

Are the under-performance complaints mostly about top-end planing speeds?

Getting up on plane and the revs required to stay there. You could except 4K+ cruising rpm for the larger 97.5-2001 290s

but, as mentioned, the later years are smaller boats and might be just fine. Especially with the more modern 4.3l fuel injected engines

 

[Little Ducky]

Here's the spec sheet for the 2006 290 DA:
http://www.searay.com/boat_graphics/electronic_brochure/company13008/54023_f.pdf

I see the 2006 4.3's are rated for 220hp...... the older version in the 1998 290 are 190hp

I like my twin 5.0's in my 1998 290 pushing out 240 hp...... in 2006 it looks like the 5.0's were pushing out 260hp.

Twin 4.3's in 2006 might be pretty good.

You can find all the spec's for older Sea Rays at the link below.
http://www.searay.com/page.aspx/pageid/162289/Owners-Resources.aspx#ModelArchives