Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

I have a 1988 24' Party Barge. I purchased it last year and refurbished her. I did not replace the motor, and it has issues. Rather than keep throwing money at the old 45 hp Mercury, I am opting for a replacement motor. The boat is set up for a Mercury outboard with tilt controls at the all in one throttle control that is mounted to the railing.

I was told only Mercury motors would work with the current tilt hardware.

I plan on putting an upper deck (8x12) on this spring with a water slide and some furniture on the deck. So that adds weigh and drag.

What size and type motor may be a good fit for this?

I would look at the capacity plate to see what the boat is rated for in maximum horsepower and weight loads. You have to push that extra weight you'll be adding, so you want to make the transom can handle the extra horsepower to push the extra weight. I would stick with Merc sized to the max capacity. Or make an extra capacity plate and add twin outboards!

as a guess its around 70 hp max

Most 24' boats are good for 115 hp maximum. What's hard is finding good used motors. Spending $8K for a brand new motor on such an old boat might be overkill. But putting a 45 hp motor on such a large boat was underkill.

I would be very hesitant to add a sundeck to that boat. They're just 8' wide boats, and just not stable enough to put people up on the roof. My old 24' Starcraft came with a hardtop (in 1985), and its 100 lbs. makes a difference in how the boat handles and rides.

[quote="Bamaman"]
I would be very hesitant to add a sundeck to that boat. They're just 8' wide boats, and just not stable enough to put people up on the roof. My old 24' Starcraft came with a hardtop (in 1985), and its 100 lbs. makes a difference in how the boat handles and rides.[/quote]

Don't know if anyone has posted this video.

No description as to what happened, but does look top heavy.
https://youtu.be/adGhE579AQ8

Our last pontoon boat was an 88' or 89' fishing barge and we had a 90hp on it...I believe that was the max rating for that particular boat. We had a 89' Mercury 90hp 3-cylinder and it was a pretty good combo on that one, I believe a 15p prop as well but don't hold me to that!

It was a 24' too.

My 1993 24 foot suntracker has a top. It was originally design to hold 4 people or 600 lbs and is 8 ft x 10 ft. In my opinion 10 ft is just too big. That size begs for more people to climb up on top. As far as top heavy, its not an issue because my top was not designed to have people on top while under way. So as the captain, that rule needs to be obeyed, lol. I wouldn't go with 12 ft, but thats me. I am building a new top which will still handle the weight of 4 people but will be much smaller. It will be 8.5 ft by 6.75 ft.