Hi Folks,
This weekend I am planning to put a deposit down on a new, built-to-order H18 bass boat. I'm super excited, as this will be my first bass boat!
Anyway, I was hoping for any last-minute input from some of you veterans familiar with the new Xpress boats. Ultimately, I really wanted to go with an X18 or even the X19, but based on all the upgrades I want, those are simply going to be out of my price range. I have to draw the line somewhere...
So I'm going with the H18 that comes standard with the Yamaha 115 SHO. The big money options I'm getting new are:
- HDS Live 12 installed at bow
- Ghost t/m installed w/ 3-n-1 transducer (plan to get Active Target eventually)
- Two 10'ft raptor poles
- Premium appearance pkg
- Interior lights
- Sway away tongue
I'm guessing in advance someone will say upgrade to the X18 to get the 150 for speed or resale. Neither of which are factors to me. My bigger debate has been squeezing the last bit of money out of me for either a set of poles or spending it on a hydraulic jack plate instead. For me, I see more practical use out of the poles based on how I like to fish. But it seems as if one of the largest complaints about xpress boats is fine tuning RPMS/trim to get max performance, so that's why second guessing a jack plate.
All said and done, I'm being quoted $42k on the head, which is about 7k over my max budget :)
Thanks in advance for any thoughts.