Official 2003.5-2008 340 Sundancer Thread

Just wanted to share this with everyone... i went to this place today that sells generator parts and services them. I was buying an oil filter and one of the technicians just happened to come out as I was asking some questions. He told me he has my same generator on the bench right now. so he brings me in the back and showed me a bunch of things. Most important was after wibterizing the last step should be to drain the carburetor. There's a small drain screw underneath carburetor. He said drain this and you'll never have a problem. So don't forget to drain your carb during winterization everyone!!
 
Want to descale the cockpit (wetbar) faucet but it doesn't seem have a removable tip like the galley faucet.
Any tricks to do it instead of tearing apart whole faucet and hoses etc ?
TIA.

Put some vinegar in a cup and soak the faucet in the cup of vinegar. Vinegar usually breaks it up (and is non-toxic), but could also use CLR as was mentioned.
 
Just wanted to share this with everyone... i went to this place today that sells generator parts and services them. I was buying an oil filter and one of the technicians just happened to come out as I was asking some questions. He told me he has my same generator on the bench right now. so he brings me in the back and showed me a bunch of things. Most important was after wibterizing the last step should be to drain the carburetor. There's a small drain screw underneath carburetor. He said drain this and you'll never have a problem. So don't forget to drain your carb during winterization everyone!!

What model generator do you have? Kohler 5E? 5ECD?
 
Put some vinegar in a cup and soak the faucet in the cup of vinegar. Vinegar usually breaks it up (and is non-toxic), but could also use CLR as was mentioned.

Thanks Jim, gonna try it.
 
Has any one here try
those garbor/drain plug led lights
any feed back on them what lumin
or wattage is sufficient
 
Just wanted to share this with everyone... i went to this place today that sells generator parts and services them. I was buying an oil filter and one of the technicians just happened to come out as I was asking some questions. He told me he has my same generator on the bench right now. so he brings me in the back and showed me a bunch of things. Most important was after wibterizing the last step should be to drain the carburetor. There's a small drain screw underneath carburetor. He said drain this and you'll never have a problem. So don't forget to drain your carb during winterization everyone!!

How does the black side/cover come off to access the carb?
 
There's no black cover over the carburetor. The screw is on the bottom of it. I think there's a spring on the screw but there's no depth setting just open and close.
 
Has anyone installed a Garmin 8212 on their 340? The blow out price is tempting but it seems like a clean looking install may not be possible.
 
How does the black side/cover come off to access the carb?

There are four bolts holding the black cover on. I believe they are somewhere around 1/2" - 9/16" heads. Once that is off, there is a flame arrestor held on by 3 flat head screws.
 
Hi guys. I posted this on a single thread also. The only reason is this thread is so long..lol Anyway here it is.

Hi guys,
I just pulled my props to get re-conditioned. A couple questions since this will be the first time getting them done ( hopefully the last for a while ) The place I went to is well known for there quality to say first off. They want $408 per prop to re-condition. That's is pitching to the original, and doing whatever has to be done. Is that a normal round about price?
Here's another thing. My WOT on a couple tests ran at around 4720 ppm on both engines at around 37 mph. Since the engines are rated at 4200-4600 I was thinking of adding a pitch to them also. Currently I'm at 21 and 21.5. I did some research and noticed SeaRay started using 22 and 22.5 on there 2007 and later models. What are the differences between the 2004 and 2007 boat engine and weight wise. I'm thinking they knew they could get a little more out of them. Has anyone ever re-propped a 340 with an additional degree of pitch? Here's the other kicker. The prop shop wants an additional 20% for every prop change. So I'm looking at a $1100 bill in total with tax. It's still 1/3 of ACME props I guess.
 
I had my original props done by prop-scan twice, and re-pitched for the same reason as you. They got the RPM's in line, but my performance increase was marginal at cruise (overall mpg) until I replaced them with ACME props. The prop scanned hy-torq's while vibration free, really didn't do much for the overall performance that I was getting before I had them scanned and pitched.

Personally, I would recommend not messing around and just getting the ACME props, the improvement is drastic. The ACME's are 18x23 if I remember right.

To my knowledge there is no difference between the 2004 to 2007 that would make any difference in weight or running characteristics. At some point, the 6.2 was discontinued as an optional powerplant, and I am pretty sure that was the only difference between those years other than a few cosmetic things.
 
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I had my original props done by prop-scan twice, and re-pitched for the same reason as you. They got the RPM's in line, but my performance increase was marginal at cruise (overall mpg) until I replaced them with ACME props. The prop scanned hy-torq's while vibration free, really didn't do much for the overall performance that I was getting before I had them scanned and pitched.

Personally, I would recommend not messing around and just getting the ACME props, the improvement is drastic. The ACME's are 18x23 if I remember right.

To my knowledge there is no difference between the 2004 to 2007 that would make any difference in weight or running characteristics. At some point, the 6.2 was discontinued as an optional powerplant, and I am pretty sure that was the only difference between those years other than a few cosmetic things.

Thanks. The ACME cost is out of my range. They want $3000 for them here. Did you ever see this post? I spoke with this gentleman on the phone and he seemed to be telling me the truth. I don't know how different our boats would perform, but they are identical. He ended up pitching them to 23 and said his WOT was at 4500. Cruise at 3400 was around 30mph. Long response...


Hello, We have a 2004 Sea Ray 340 with 8.1lt V-drives. We purchased it last summer and besides replacing a few bad sensors, it has been rock solid in reliability. We take it out every weekend and have ventured down to key largo and Islamorada multiple times from Fort Lauderdale. I've been doing all kinds of research to increase performance and efficiency for those longer trips. Those test results on boattest.com were from a sea ray 340 with Bravo III sterndrives. On the V-drive setup, factory propellers are 18" x 4 blade with a 21 pitch and my experience is a top speed of 38 mph at 4700 rpms and a good cruise speed of 28 mph at 3600 rpm with this factory setup. The boat always felt like it had a lot more potential. Mercruiser's recommended WOT RPM on the 8.1's is 4600. I was over revving a bit and the boat felt like I could get a better plane at a lower rpm, almost like driving an old muscle car down the highway with 4.11 gears. A ton of acceleration, but revving too high when cruising and top speed. At 28 mph, it felt like the bow was still riding a little high and it was still climbing up hill like it wasn't completely on plane. I like to bring the trim tabs all the way up during cruise for less drag. I notice a speed difference if the trim tabs are down. If I brought the RPM's up to 3900 or 4000, the boat would flatten right out and really feel like it was skipping across the water but cruising at 4000 sucks fuel and I feel is extra wear on the engines. I'm sure when Sea Ray decided to use this prop setup, they factored in the boat being fully loaded with 12 people and gear, etc and they needed a safe prop to run for the masses. They run these same engines in the 380 and bigger I believe and I feel there is a lot more potential to be explored with this boat and I think it's just finding the right prop setup. If I could go back I probably would have looked more for an outdrive setup and getting a boat lift as you do gain a lot more speed and better GPH due to the lower resistance of the stern setup plus having the added comfort of being able to trim the drives up when it gets shallow. I've stirred up a bit of sand a few times cruising the keys trying to explore some of the natural islands. Here is an article I found wile doing my research and it is a very good read if you are on the market for a boat like this. http://www.searay.com/boat_graphics/...2491/TST_9.pdf

I started to experiment with the props when I had the boat hauled a couple of months ago for bottom paint. I decided to have the propellers pitched to 22 vs the factory 21. For some reason my mechanic strongly recommended against this along with the propeller shop. I had a bit of an argument with the guy at the propeller shop because they told me according to their calculations, I would loose 200 rpms at WOT and I would be putting to much load on the engines, however, I had this very strong gut feeling that re-pitching would be a benefit. After launching the boat with the newly re-pitched props and fresh bottom paint, I was more than happy with the results. The boat still jumps on plane as it always had and when I bring the RPM"s to 3600, the boat flattens right out and skips across the water at a very comfortable and efficient 32 mph. Top speed breaks 40 mph and I'm still revving 4600 to 4700 RPMs. I'm assuming a fresh bottom paint job helped a bit but I still feel there is a lot more room for improvement. When I open it up to WOT from cruise speed, the the engines thrust the boat forward without any struggle. These really are big engines for this size boat. I will be purchasing a set of ACME propellers soon and with their precision manufacturing process, I'm going to step it up to a 24 pitch and see what happens keeping the ones I have now as spares. My goal is to have a comfortable 3600 RPM cruise speed at 36 mph or higher. It seems the boat really starts to suck fuel over 3600 rpm. I'm not too concerned about top speed but it would be nice to see the boat crack 45 mph which I feel very confident it will. I'll keep you posted when I do this with results.
 
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Hi guys. I posted this on a single thread also. The only reason is this thread is so long..lol Anyway here it is.

Hi guys,
I just pulled my props to get re-conditioned. A couple questions since this will be the first time getting them done ( hopefully the last for a while ) The place I went to is well known for there quality to say first off. They want $408 per prop to re-condition. That's is pitching to the original, and doing whatever has to be done. Is that a normal round about price?
Here's another thing. My WOT on a couple tests ran at around 4720 ppm on both engines at around 37 mph. Since the engines are rated at 4200-4600 I was thinking of adding a pitch to them also. Currently I'm at 21 and 21.5. I did some research and noticed SeaRay started using 22 and 22.5 on there 2007 and later models. What are the differences between the 2004 and 2007 boat engine and weight wise. I'm thinking they knew they could get a little more out of them. Has anyone ever re-propped a 340 with an additional degree of pitch? Here's the other kicker. The prop shop wants an additional 20% for every prop change. So I'm looking at a $1100 bill in total with tax. It's still 1/3 of ACME props I guess.

Which prop shop are you using?
 
Got a call back yesterday. He did a prop scan and from the info I gave him he pitched them to 22 and 22.5. Said I should gain around 2-3 Knots from what they looked like before and how they look now. I'll try to post a couple pics of the props and scans when I get them.
Prop 3.jpgProp 4.jpg
 
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Hi all,

I know these must been discussed but couldn't find and didn't wanna start a new thread, hope someone can help me to where to find/buy them.

1) Need to replace the top side led lights inside the electrical panel in the cabin.

2) Stern Nav light cover is sun damaged and need a new plastic cover.

3) Head shower handle.

TIA
 

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