Thread:

Omega Panther to Berk Conversion Question

Hope you could help me out Greg.......I have a 1978 20.5 Omega Mini Day Cruiser. My father in-law has the matching Carrera Elite. The boats are virtually identical hull wise. Having a 200 hp advantage on him, he still had 7 mph on me via gps. So after much research, I decided to yank the Panther and install the Berk JG instead. I have so far removed the Panther Pump/insert and filled the hole it left with epoxy. My brother and I were planning on doing a pump set back (performance gain, easy hand hole access, etc). But after doing some reading here on the site, I realized that my inside strakes end about 3 ft from the transom. I was wondering if you had any thoughts on this. The father in-law's boat is a nice riding boat, his pump is not set back and while I will never be trying to go 100 mph in my boat, I do plan on getting it to the 70 mph mark eventually.

Thanks for any input......Joe

Originally Posted by greg shoemaker

Beleive it or not but the Carrera and the Omega in those days were built within a 100 yards of each other on Sunshine Way in Anaheim Ca. The decks are slightly different but the bottoms i beleive are very similar. Your research is correct to move you pump out that far will create problems. When you see boats with the handhole cover outside of the boat you will also notice the transom is completely flat on the Carrera and the Omega both have a 12 degree angled transom so the handhole appears to be farther in but actually is in the same spot as the flat transom boat. I'm was wondering if you had considered the American Turbine panther conversion?

Thanks for the response......Yes I considered the conversion, but the fact that while the conversion shows marked improvement over a stock Panther, it is still a Panther if you ever try to sell the boat. Anything less performance wise than the JG would have been disappointing as well. Add in the fact that I enjoy punishing myself with projects like these and I have driven a boat of my type with a JG and have felt/seen the difference (which is HUGE) and it was a no brainer that the complete change out was the way to go for me.

As far as the project, I have spent the past 3 weeks filling the hole the Panther insert filled at the keel. The jet boat performance website has a pretty detailed link doing a similar conversion and explaining in pictures what needs to be done as far as the fiberglass work. As of yesterday, we cut the hole and set/installed the Berk intake.....Still much work to be done, construcing adapter plate, motor plates and rails but the hard part is over.......Thanks again for your input.....Joe

Just wanted to update this thread.....The conversion is complete and the results are incredible......Did not really gain anything speed-wise initially, but the WOT rpm I run at has been decreased by 1000 rpm, from 5800 rpm to 4800 rpm to achieve the same top speed. Having a true Place Diverter is awesome, vs. the piece of square tubing that Panther pins inside of their pump and calls a diverter. I did go ahead with the set back, it was a roll of the dice but ended up working out. I also added a droop just a month or so ago and between the two, it really helped get the boat out of the water and gain a few mph. Below is a pic of my daughter and I messing around at Parker just a couple of weeks ago. Next addition.......650 hp. Thanks again, this was by far the best change I ever made to this boat.