Direct Drive vs. V Drive

Can anyone help me out with this? Aside from the difference in seating and location, is there a big difference?

Which throws a better wake? Which handles better? I am purchasing a 2003 Sanger DLX for $25k (hopefully a good deal) with tower and want to know the advantadges and disadvantadges with the Direct Drive versus the V drive. DLX vs V210?

I am planning on using this boat mainly for Wakeboarding and tubing but I'm newer to the sport so don't need a competition boat.

Help....

How are Sangers? They seem like solid boats for the price. This one I'm looking at has 46 hours on it and is clean clean clean.

I know they are good all around boats but will the true wakeboarders be caught riding behind one?

floodgates open...

I have a 03 sanger v drive. The v drive will throw a better wake but the direct drives turn on a dime and handle better all around. Casual boarders will be fine with the direct drive. Maintanance is by far easier with the direct drive as space is very limited in the engine compartment in the v drive. Hope this helps.

weighted properly that dlx will throw an awesome wake... obivously the v210 will throw a better wake with less weight.. i guarntee a "true wakeboarder" would be more than happy to take a pull behind it..

Heres my understandings

Wake: V
Handling: D, althought the V215 from Sanger is amazing

Depending on the hull, direct drives or v-drives can make great crossover boats (ski and board). Direct drives are better for making competition ski wakes whereas v-drives tend to make better wakeboard wakes.

As far as Sangers, we are loving ours thus far. From what I heard, the wakes are of great quality. We went with ours because of the price which is hard to beat for a new boat. We didnt test out the Mastercrafts or Malibus bc the salesman at the boat show was a flat out moron. The supra guy was super cool and really showcased their product well, yet in the end the Sanger was the best bang for the buck. The dealer was also super helpful and extremely polite. Sangers will be harder to find used bc people who buy them tend to keep them. They also only produce some xxx amount a year. I think its like 500 or 600, not sure though. Im sure you can find some here and there on the internet but nothing compared to the selection of Malibus and Mastercrafts.

BTW, welcome to the forums. There are tons of people, literally, who should respond. I know I dont have a butt load of posts but I lurk and check these forums at least a dozen times a day. You should get plenty of replies to help with your decision. Good Luck

(Correct anything I said that is wrong. I dont get mad or make judgements. You cant deny facts.)

Sean,

Thats a fair price for that boat IMO. I just bought a 2000 V210 and I came across more than a few that were less than clean and the asking price was 25K.

Sanger has a very loyal following and for good reasons. Well built and reliable with hull designs that have stood the test of time. DLX is a great all-around boat and will do all watersports well. I know you've already made up your mind, and you'll be very happy, but for that kind of money, I myself would hold out for a V210. The difference in handling is small, but the storage factor and more room, even when weighted for boarding makes the big difference. I would say that V-drives are more in demand when it comes to re-sale also.

V-drives are better for the overall size of the wake. In general, putting the weight as far back as possible will make the wake bigger. Not necessarialy better, but certainly bigger. Note that many people end up adding weight up in the bow just to get a better wake shape.

The direct drive will handle better. They are typically lighter, better balanced, and thus more nimble.

I have owned two direct drive boats and now a V-drive (Super Air Nautique).

If I wanted to waterski I would want that old direct drive boat back that I owned way back when. It had a small engine but was still really fast, turned incredibly sharp and left a tiny wake.

If I wanted to just cruise with one or two other people I would want the second direct drive boat (Air Nautique). It had a bigger engine than the first boat, but still was fairly nimble and was easy on the gas. I had a "barefoot boom" which was really great for teaching little kids to ski/wakeboard.

If I want to pull a tube or a wakeboarder I like the V-Drive. Wakeboarding is obvious, the wake is killer. For pulling a tube the tow point is behind the seats so there are not as many issues with the tow rope and passengers. Everyone sits closer together which makes crusing with a group better. The rear seats are farther foward and thus a much drier ride. It turns well enough.

V-drive is definitely the way to go if you're going to be wakeboarding the majority of the time. I've owned both dd and v-drive, and i'll say that the layout is much more preferable in the v-drive as well. Everyone is somewhat close together. In the ddrive the folks sitting on the back bench are somewhat seperated from everyone else. That, plus the v-drive also offers a great lounge area in the back when you're stopped (though some variations of the Sanger version have a hump in the back).

As everyone here has pointed out, handling is definitely nicer on the d-drive, much easier.

Lastly, I've only owned MC and my current Nautique, but I've ridden on some Sangers, and they definitely have a following as a quality boat at a good price that throw a great wake.

Only downside i know of is supposedly it rides pretty low when heavily weighted and some folks don't like wood stringers. I personally don't think it's an issue, especially if your boat doesn't sit in the water 24/7, and some say that it makes for a better quality boat, stronger than foam. Hope I didn't open the floodgates on that one...

If you weight the two boats the same the difference between the v drive and the dd's wake is none. With the v-drive you just have more weight in the rear to start. The biggest difference is space.

Scot, I've never seen a direct drive put out the same wake as its v-drive counterpart. Theoretically you're right, if the weight is distributed identically, the wakes should be equal sized; I've just never seen it, even on a heavily back weighted direct drive

Scot:
If you had identical hulls and weighted them identically then the wake should be identical.

However, it is very unlikely that the hulls would be identical between the direct drive and V-drive, and I think it would be very difficult to get the center of mass on a direct drive as far back as it would be on a V-drive. A V-8 engine weighs a lot, and it is pretty far foward in a direct drive.

Scot is dead on. I can't believe this is even a topic anymore. Up until last year the two boats that I rode behind most often were a V210 (a buddies) and a DLX Wake (mine). I actually thought my wake was better than his. Actually for a couple reasons: first it has the motor in the middle which was a better starting point for ballast, secondly the ballast was all the way in the rear of the boat right underneath the gas tank. With the Gas tank full and the ballast full I got as much weight in the far back as I needed. I added some lead to the nose and balanced it with lead in the far back, then added a sac under the floor and Voila..... A stompin' wake. When we had a bunch of riders that was how we left it. When it was only a couple of up we would put a sack across the floor in the back behind the motor box to compensate for people sitting in the back.

OK, here it is: When weighted the two boats are identical (same hull, remember). They throw the same wake and handle the same. Un-weighted the V-210 will have a more vert wake. Un-weighted the DLX will handle better.

Both are great boats. The V-drive has better storage. The DLX is easier to work on and IMO the direct drive transmissions are stronger. I actually like the layout of the direct drives so I say they are equal in that aspect. I think the boats like the D215 are going to get more popular in the next few years. I like the rear facing seats they provide. My favorite seat in the DLX was on the backseat facing backwards with my legs up on the rear storage and leaning against the motor. It was like being on a chaise-lounge with a great view of the rider.

I bet you could get a deal on this one!

Not a Sanger.... That pic makes me sad everytime I see it.

I agree that scot nailed it, vdrive advantage is space and space alone....which is a nice advantage.

Is the prop in the same location on DD & VD ? If not it might change the wake a little.

That guy has some serious ballast issues.

I was in that Sanger today and it handled really solid. Wakes were actually not too shabby with no ballast at all (we couldn't get the tanks to fill). I just think that I like the room with the V-Drive. I'm still looking.....See my other post.

Some of us actually are convinced direct drives are roomier since all the passengers are not all crammed together

Direct drives roomier? Don't know about that. I don't see any comparison when it comes to boarding. V-drive hands down. Just look on all the boat selling web sites. A ton of used dd's for sale and only a few used vd's for sale. What's that tell ya about the market?

I do know about that, quite a bit actually. I guess I prefer to be more spread out in the boat. I always feel cramped in Vdrives. people's legs sprawled over wach other. granted this is 21 ft vdrives, comparing apples to apples. the new big boats have TONS of room. that being said, I don't know of many 23-24 ft direct drives.

The market is definately in favor of Vdrives as they are definately better suited for people who only wakeboard. fat sacks out of the way and the weight of the engine in the back of the boat.

Get a VDRIVE because wakeboarding is a SOCIAL sport. At least it is for me!

Yes, the wakes are the same. The only difference is where you locate the engine, ballast and passengers.

In the end, its a HULL with a MASS and a CENTER of GRAVITY.

Hey, I got an idea, everyone on here that used to own a ddrive and then bought a vdrive, lets all sell em and buy ddrives again!

Jay,

I understand that your love for vdrives is allowing you to be sarcastic and condescending about my opinion, but my goal was not to say that vdrives are better or worse than direct drives, just state something that I have observed in my experience.

GD,

I have never noticed a problem being social with people a few feet away from me, rather than them practically being on my lap.

Tim, a friend of mine and I alternated using each others boats for a couple of years. My boat was a vdrive BU VLX and his boat was a ddrive CC SPORT. Both great boats. My boat had tons of storage and all the ballast hidden. His boat had no storage and all the ballast covering the floor. Sitting in the back of the CC sucked. It was always wet and it was difficult to talk to people up front while underway. Walking in the CC also sucked. It was like a obstacle course.

Timmy, actualy, I love being on the water period, in any boat. I did not pose the original question, someone else did. This is a wakeboarding site with a lot of former ddrive and now vdrive owners. It's kinda a loaded question with what I think is an obvious answer. Don't take my messin' the wrong way, it's all good.

i've still yet to see a d-drive's wake compare to a v-drive on the same hull. the boat's i've ridden behind include a sport nautique (d-drive) and a SAN (v-drive), a prostar 205 (d-drive) and an x-2 (v-drive), and an xti (d-drive) and a vlx (v-drive). without question, the v-drive's wake beat out the d-drive in every instance, even when we tried to weigh the direct-drive to match the vee. i'm not saying you guys are wrong, just that weighing them equally isn't quite as easy as it may seem. the only d-drive boat i've seen that measured up to its v-drive counterpart is the old supra launch d-drive

Dang, that boat is slammed.