Volvo IPS Pods - Worth It?

[whoover]

We have one boat in our club with pods. Its 45' and about four years old. He trades boats about every five years so he has warranty I think. Its a very nice boat, handles great and has great fuel econmy. He has the money to do it that way. We had another boat, I think a 2007 with pods. The guy just had to have it because his boat docking skills are terrible. Everyone told him that he could not afford the boat with those drives. He asked me to help him bring it back from Cape Cod to the great lakes. I declined so he hired a captain. One drive failed about three days after leaving and finally returned here on one. Long story shortened is that both drives were trashed and the insurance company wrote the boat off, not worth fixing. Great idea but you need deep pockets to maintain or trade in before the warranty runs out.

Walt Hoover

 

[sgharford]

My neighbor with late model Azimut and 3 pods is full on character, this was his first boat. He's quite and unassuming, but no fear. First time I met him 3 seasons ago was his second time out. It was 4pm on a Tuesday and he and his wife taking the boat straight to Nantucket and left the dock 15 minutes later! My mouth dropped, he said it would only take him 8 hours. Having done that same trip a year earlier, took us a week. I pictured me driving to Florida from New York, last thing I do is plug and address into google maps and say, OK - 24 hours, here we go!. They are the nicest couple and use the boat extensively for week+ stints all over the north east. He drives a beautiful late model mercedes sedan. Guess is when they sold him this boat, with all it's bells and whistles, said 'don't worry about it, it's all under warranty'. He's a great sport about it and absolutely loves boating, but a shame this boat has probably shaped his reality of near daily electrical issues and breakdowns being normal.

 

[rourkeh]

I have a friend with a pair of version 1's in his older Tiara and they have been a constant nightmare.
Also the parts are hard to get and if one of the Gen 1's fail you can not get a new one as they do not manufacture that model any more. You would have to replace with two of the latest version at a cost of around $50K.

 

[jim rosenthal]

RAC, probably the same boat, maybe the same friend if you have a buddy in Annapolis..