Mako 264

A center console, narrow beam (8'6") open fisherman deep vee hull. We surveyed a 1992 model (in mid '97) fitted with a full tower, dual controls and twin Evinrude 200's mounted on an aluminum transom bracket bolted to the hull. It had an extensive electronics package, including autopilot, Furuno CVS, Trimble NavTrac and many others. The boat had spent its entire life in the Cayman Islands and was kept on davits. The 203 gallon fuel tank gives it fairly good range.

Without a tower, there is nothing impressive looking about this one. The hull style is rather plane-Jane and looks like a mold that's been kicking around south Florida for quite a while. One feature is that it has recessed trim tab pockets. Cockpit has built in rod racks each side, two fish wells, bait well aft, anchor locker in vee up forward and storage under open bow seating forward.

I wasn't particularly impressed with the center console layout which has Morse shift and throttle controls mounted down low at just above knee level, on an angled forward face. It was okay for the shifters, but having to lift the throttles up to accelerate was awkward and difficult, a major design flaw. Steering and engine instrument placement was generally good.

With a 14' tower (above W/L) I expected this boat to be a bit tender and roll excessively, but I was pleasantly surprised. The real strong suit of this boat is, in a word, performance. Flying along at around 40 MPH in a narrow section of the Intra coastal, crowded with other boats and lots of big wakes, the motion in the tower was surprisingly smooth. No heavy bucking, pitching or rolling. She is a heavy boat with a very nice ride, as well it should be with such a narrow beam and deep vee. When hull slams, there are not a lot of loose parts rattling and making noise, common to so many other boats. It actually felt better running from the tower than the lower station, which is unusual. For an outboard, she would pivot on a loose axis and backed down reasonably well. During docking, I could crab her sideways toward the dock very nicely.

Originally she had a middling price and overall quality is about the same. The decks are plywood cored; the console is screwed to the deck and it looks like water got into the core on one side as evidenced by a soft spot. There was virtually no access to the internal hull, not on the sides or the bottom, all of which seems to be filled with foam for positive floatation. Tower was bolted screwed to deck but there weren't any significant stress cracks anywhere. Hull had no blisters. Here are a few of our gripes:

This boat had been sitting out in the Caribbean sun for 4 years uncovered and looks ten years old. With a sale price of around $25k, the seller lost about 60% of his investment in just four years. This was partly due to over investment in extra equipment, but also poor maintenance. But a few design flaws and a lot of plastic didn't help.

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