Stu Jone’s restoration of  an epic Cigarette 38 Top Gun  with Mercury  Racing 540 sterndrives has been a resounding success.  Deemed Project 1080, the vintage Florida Powerboat Club pace boat has been completely refreshed from bow to stern.

Work began with replacing  mechanical throttle and shift Mercury Racing Bulldog sterndrives with our  8.6 Liter 540 sterndrives featuring  modern Digital Throttle & Shift (DTS) technology.

Mercury Racing Digital Zero Effort Controls signal driver intent – providing  digital throttle and shift signals to the potent 540hp engines. Power is transferred to Bravo One XR sterndrives spinning Mercury Racing Lab Finished Bravo I propellers.  Integrated Transom Systems  (ITS) featuring Integral steering rams provide a clean installation of the robust XR drives. K-Plane trim tabs assist in getting the classic vee -bottom up on plane as well as adjusting  hull attitude while underway.

Vitals View 

Vital engine and hull data  is provided real-time via a touchscreen Mercury  703 VesselView monitor.  It has more information and data on boat and engine functions than any other system in the boating industry: rpm, speed, fuel flow and efficiency, temperature, trim, and more.

Project 1080  also uses twin  Garmin 7612 XSV chart plotters for engine  data display as well as navigation.  Stu walks us through the VesselView 703 features in the latest Project 1080 Update video.

Stay tuned for the next Project 1080 update where Stu will run us through the operation of K-Plane trim tabs and provide performance results from updating the Bravo One XR drives with surface piercing Sport Master gearcases.