krs616
Member
Bought our first Searay last summer, 2004 290 Amberjack with 350 mag's and bravo 3 drives.
We love this boat for fishing and cruising. We only stayed overnight a couple different weekends. The V Berth is not big enough for me (6'). I will need to add on to berth towards the head i guess.
I put an older Garmin 4210 in the dash with an 18HD radar up top. Fit in dash great.
My port drive has about 6"-7" of slop and i need to do the JRMarine fix before May.
Drives need to be sanded and painted, replace anodes and add prop anode.
I want to add an autopilot but seems i need to switch over to hydraulic steering first.
I want to be able to run either engine when trolling so hydraulic seems like way to go.
Trolling engine is accumulating way more hours because only 1 engine is plumbed for power assist steering.
Looks like about 5 - 6 Canadian boat dollars to add hydraulic steering and autopilot.
When i bought the boat the port motor wouldn't rev up to specs. Guy said he just had a complete tune up done in spring on both engines because starboard wasn't running right. When he ran the boat after tuneup the port engine was lagging. I bought boat anyway and it took 4 hours to run boat home. Boat got up on plane but had to have port engine throttle 3/4 or more to get 3500 rpm and if i pulled back on starboard throttle the port would loose rpm's. I spent many hours trying to figure this out. Got a mechanic to come put his computer on engine and go for ride, but it it never had any codes related to an rpm/loss of power issue. So i kept banging my head off dash trying to figure it out over next couple weeks.
Anyway in the tuneup they replaced rotors,caps,plugs,wires,fuel filters and changed oil. I have receipt for this. I decided to buy new rotor,cap and wires in case they were bad from store. I started with changing out the wires, i didn't just pull one and replace it same way, i pulled wire replaced it and made sure it was same on starboard motor. Well when i got to 7 and 3 wires, i think (it was last summer), they were reversed. I switched them and took boat for a ride. Both motors pulled up equally and ran awesome. I called the mechanic that did the work, needless to stay he said somebody must have been in there messing with wires. Ya right, guy i bought it off of has never had grease on his hands. I just can't figure out why no codes showed up on computer. Anyway both engines run great now.
I fish on the great lakes and seems like a full tank of fresh water does not last a full day when i am constantly washing blood off the deck, top of cooler, swim platform etc. with deck the hose.
I am going to try and splice into a/c fresh water intake and use that for wash down so i would have endless supply. If anyone has did this please fill me in on details.
VHF needs to be replaced, it works but mike cord is a mess.
All in all this boat is in awesome shape but needs a few minor things.
I would love vesselview also but need to get these other things off my list first.
Sorry for the long winded first post.
Glad to see some new activity on this thread! I've narrowed down my search and the 290AJ is at the top of the list to replace my 270AJ!
One I will be looking at has a nasty rust stain from the hot water heater. I was told it's from winterizing it, but the rust stain will drive me nuts, even if it's just cosmetic in the bilge! Any advice on painting the bilge area the standard gray?
Type of paint etc...?
Also, what type of performance can be expected of a 2004 with 5.0 Merc B3 drives?