Power Boats
Buy and sell power boats in Guatemala.
Ask about a lancha dentro de borda in Río Dulce or San Lucas Tolimán and it usually turns out to be an older American runabout: a marinised V6 or V8 under the engine box and a sterndrive leg through the transom. Alongside those come outboard centre consoles rigged for sailfish off the Pacific coast and cabin boats built for a night at anchor, new and pre-owned. Which drive a boat has, and the water it has lived on, tells you more about its value than the name on the hull.
Sterndrive runabouts and outboard boats:
the drive divides power boats here more than length does. A sterndrive, the dentro de borda of local listings, puts the engine inside the hull and only the leg outside, which leaves a flat swim platform and a quieter ride. It is the classic lake boat, found in Bayliner, Sea Ray and Chaparral runabouts and bowriders, many imported second-hand years ago, and most cabin boats with a cuddy or a small berth use the same drive. Outboard boats hang the engine off the stern, where it tilts clear of the water. Centre consoles built for the Pacific sailfish run are nearly all outboard, because a motor that lifts out can be rinsed after salt water and swapped without opening up the boat. Inflatables and small tenders have their own place under dinghies.
Engine size for a lake as high as Atitlán:
thin air costs an engine there a noticeable share of its power, fuel injection or not. A runabout that jumps onto plane with a few aboard at sea level can wallow with the whole family on the lake, so a lake boat wants more engine than the brochure minimum. A boat that ran well on the coast will feel slower once it is driven up, so judge it on the water where it will be used. Parts weigh in too. MerCruiser and Volvo Penta drives are still supported, but OMC went out of business long ago, so an OMC Cobra leg lives on aftermarket and salvaged parts. An outboard boat is the easier one to bring back when the motor is tired, since a new outboard engine bolts onto the same transom.
Old runabouts and cabin boats in quetzales:
a 1990s runabout of 17 to 23 feet with a V6 or V8 sterndrive, often with its trailer, is asked around Q80,000 to Q100,000, while a mid-twenties-foot cabin boat in good order sits closer to Q300,000. A new import of the same size costs several times as much. The old runabouts are cheap for their size because the buyer is already pricing in a bellows and gimbal job and an engine whose real hours nobody knows: the hull outlasts everything bolted into it.
Bellows, gimbal bearing and risers on a used sterndrive:
the rubber bellows around the drive crack with sun and age, and once one splits the boat takes on water and the gimbal bearing behind it rusts. Shine a torch over them, then swing the leg from side to side: a growl from inside the transom is that bearing on its way out. On the engine, look for rust weeping from the exhaust manifolds and risers, which corrode from the inside and can eventually let water into the cylinders. Read the tags on the drive and the engine, and be wary of a freshly painted engine in an old boat with no receipts behind it. Lift the engine box after the run and look for water or fuel in the bilge. Then take it out loaded the way you will load it and see whether it climbs onto plane without a struggle.
A lancha moored below a lake house:
many change hands when a family stops coming down at weekends. Give the make and length, the hull year and the engine year separately, the drive brand, the hours if you know them, and when the bellows were last changed. Say whether it lived on a mooring or a trailer, and on fresh or salt water. Photograph the open engine bay, the leg from behind, the helm and the hull out of the water if you can, and have the papers ready. Someone driving in from Zacapa or the capital will ask where the boat is kept and where it can be lifted out, because a boat on Atitlán without a trailer only leaves the lake on somebody else’s.