With the West Coast performance-boat market sluggish at best, most builders are sticking with their existing model lines for 2010. Not so at Eliminator Performance Boats in Perris Valley, Calif., where company owner Bob Leach and his team are tooling a new-for-2010 model called the 27 Speedster. Production on the 27-foot-long catamaran is scheduled to begin in the next couple of months.
The 27 Speedster follows on the heels of the company’s popular 28 Speedster. Like its larger sibling, it will have the signature “Speedster” wraparound windshield and a wider cockpit. But the big news is that builder will offer the 27 Speedster with single stern-drive or twin outboard power. To accommodate the different power packages, Eliminator is tooling two versions of the 27-footer’s engine hatch, as well as expanding the space in the engine compartment.
Why offer a new model that’s shorter than the first offering in the Speedster series?
“These days, most manufacturers are going with bigger and wider models, but the margin of prospective buyers gets smaller as you bigger,” Jake Fraleigh of Eliminator told me this morning. “With a smaller model you expand your margin of potential buyers—it’s more affordable, it’s easier to get financing.
“The numbers of calls I’ve been getting in the past two days on the 27 Speedster has been amazing,” he added.
Prices for the model have not been set.
 |
 |
 |
 |
With the West Coast performance-boat market sluggish at best, most builders are sticking with their existing model lines for 2010. Not so at Eliminator Performance Boats in Perris Valley, Calif., where company owner Bob Leach and his team are tooling a new-for-2010 model called the 27 Speedster. Production on the 27-foot-long catamaran is scheduled to begin in the next couple of months.
The 27 Speedster follows on the heels of the company’s popular 28 Speedster. Like its larger sibling, it will have the signature “Speedster” wraparound windshield and a wider cockpit. But the big news is that builder will offer the 27 Speedster with single stern-drive or twin outboard power. To accommodate the different power packages, Eliminator is tooling two versions of the 27-footer’s engine hatch, as well as expanding the space in the engine compartment.
Why offer a new model that’s shorter than the first offering in the Speedster series?
“These days, most manufacturers are going with bigger and wider models, but the margin of prospective buyers gets smaller as you bigger,” Jake Fraleigh of Eliminator told me this morning. “With a smaller model you expand your margin of potential buyers—it’s more affordable, it’s easier to get financing.
“The numbers of calls I’ve been getting in the past two days on the 27 Speedster has been amazing,” he added.
Prices for the model have not been set.
and then