skibum
Well-Known Member
Hello everyone. My name is Michael. Yesterday, my partner, Dave, and I took delivery of our 2005 Sundancer 260 from it's previous owner. It was also my 43rd birthday, so I consider this a b'day present to myself. The weather out here (northern Chesapeake) was not good for boating. Fortunately, it only took us about 15 minutes to get it from the owner's pier to the marina where we will be keeping it. We spent most of the afternoon just tied to the dock cleaning her up.
She had only 53 hours on her. We are the 3rd owners. The 1st one apparently wanted a larger one after his first season. He kept it in a boatel. The 2nd owner kept it on a lift, and used it only twice this season. Not hard to believe considering the number of spider webs going from the lift to the hull.
We took it out for a brief run later on in the day, but we had 6 people on board so we took it easy.
I was concerned that there was something wrong with it because I found it very difficult to steer, get on plane, etc.. After reading some of the posts about drive trim, trim tabs, weight distribution, etc., on here this morning, I see that we just need to get out on her and practice driving (is that the proper term for it?). On at least 2 ocassions, I chopped power because she was starting to bowsteer. I had no clue what it was called yesterday, but it did indeed scare the bejeebas out of me. I had the feeling that I was on the brink of a very hard turn. Seemed to me that the port side of the bow was about to dig in and pivot us about it.
I'm not used to having a sterndrive and power steering, either. There is nothing to look at back there to see if you have the wheel turned, and the power steering seems to leave me with little, if any, "feel" for the controls. This is going to take a little while to get used to for sure.
Thanks in advance for all of your future help with the dumb questions that I will be posting on here from now on. I hope to be knowledgeable enough to help others with their 260 questions some day.
Michael
She had only 53 hours on her. We are the 3rd owners. The 1st one apparently wanted a larger one after his first season. He kept it in a boatel. The 2nd owner kept it on a lift, and used it only twice this season. Not hard to believe considering the number of spider webs going from the lift to the hull.
We took it out for a brief run later on in the day, but we had 6 people on board so we took it easy.
I was concerned that there was something wrong with it because I found it very difficult to steer, get on plane, etc.. After reading some of the posts about drive trim, trim tabs, weight distribution, etc., on here this morning, I see that we just need to get out on her and practice driving (is that the proper term for it?). On at least 2 ocassions, I chopped power because she was starting to bowsteer. I had no clue what it was called yesterday, but it did indeed scare the bejeebas out of me. I had the feeling that I was on the brink of a very hard turn. Seemed to me that the port side of the bow was about to dig in and pivot us about it.
I'm not used to having a sterndrive and power steering, either. There is nothing to look at back there to see if you have the wheel turned, and the power steering seems to leave me with little, if any, "feel" for the controls. This is going to take a little while to get used to for sure.
Thanks in advance for all of your future help with the dumb questions that I will be posting on here from now on. I hope to be knowledgeable enough to help others with their 260 questions some day.
Michael
