Our New Baby, 2024 252SE 🎉

[Acard7]

Well it’s official, we signed the paperwork yesterday and mailed it back to River Valley Marine in Rochester, MN. We have a new 252SE. Came with a 3 year warranty on everything and a free cover. No dealer fees at all besides a documentation fee of 500 bucks, so that was nice not seeing the dealer prep or freight or any other hidden fees. The wife and kids couldn’t be more excited for this upcoming boating season. We’ve already picked a couple VRBOs for Lake Red Rock (Knoxville, IA) over the 4th of July weekend and one week in August on Lake of the Ozarks. As well as using it as much as possible on our lake close to home.

The wife wants to learn to drive this one since it has electronic throttles, so we will see how that goes! We’ll get a phone call next week from the sales guy as to when we can pick it up. Already talked to him about making sure the connext screen recall will be fixed before our arrival too. Pic below is their floor model, ours is still wrapped from factory.



I guess a whole month without a boat payment was nice!

I’ll update this thread when we go pick it up and the eventual maiden voyage for break-in!

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Outstanding!!!!!!

Congratulations and best wishes on boating season 2025!

 

[tdonoughue]

Congrats! We will certainly need more pics once you get it set up...

 

[WiskyDan]

That a beaut, Clark!!

 

[Babin Farms]

Nice!!!

Ready to plan a Bimini trip now?

 

[IA_210SX]

Congrats. Where would you boat regularly? Ever try Rathbun? It’s a trek but if I had to try again in Iowa I’d try that. With a jet boat and the weeds in Okoboji, I’d advise against there.

 

[Acard7]

Congrats. Where would you boat regularly? Ever try Rathbun? It’s a trek but if I had to try again in Iowa I’d try that. With a jet boat and the weeds in Okoboji, I’d advise against there.

So we go to Mozingo Lake just East of Maryville, MO for most of our boating. Sometimes we go up to Lake Icaria near Corning, IA, but both lakes are within 35 min of us. We like Mozingo most because it’s much larger, cleaner, and deeper. We have been to Rathbun once before but without a boat! We went to Red Rock over the 4th in the past and really enjoyed it, didn’t seem like it was horrible busy on the water either with the 230. But that 6-lane elk rock ramp was something else haha!

We actually bought our AR230 from Oak Hill Marina at Boji, they said the weeds were definitely an issue. Boji Is about 4 hours from us so we would rather plan long trips to the ozarks since the season is much longer down there.

 

[Acard7]

Nice!!!

Ready to plan a Bimini trip now?

Definitely on our to-do list someday! Our youngest is 3 in May of this year, not really sure when would be a good age to take her, but shooting for before she starts kindergarten maybe.

 

[WiskyDan]

Is the hull all white above the water line or is it grey?

 

[Acard7]

Is the hull all white above the water line or is it grey?

It’s all white besides one blue stripe at the water line! Below might be better pic.

 

[WiskyDan]

Love the clean look - I’m jelly!!

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Definitely on our to-do list someday! Our youngest is 3 in May of this year, not really sure when would be a good age to take her, but shooting for before she starts kindergarten maybe.

No time like the present.. kids are tough!

 

[Acard7]

We made it home last night with the 252SE! Got stuck on i35 two times in bumper to bumper construction traffic so it got us home just after dark. I have a few pics and more to come! Really informative walkthrough by David from River Valley in Rochester. It’s crazy how much quieter the blower fan and engines were on the trailer as I had just got done servicing the AR230!

I’m glad we haven’t sold the AR230 yet, because I wanted to compare them, and obviously the 250 hull looks like a monster next to it. Already have a new bow roller to install and going to order the NOCO charger to have next week.

Trying to get the wife to call in sick Sunday since it will be 83 degrees and I want to break this baby in!

 

[BumbleBee255]

That cover is $1000! Free!!! BTW, how did the cover do at freeway speeds?

 

[Acard7]

That cover is $1000! Free!!! BTW, how did the cover do at freeway speeds?

It sucked down like any of them would. I traveled anywhere from 64-77mph all the way home. It did well, stopped a few times to check on everything. You can definitely feel the difference in that cover though, thicker and definitely seems sturdier!

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Das a big gurl..

 

[YoDaddy292]

Dude! Super jealous here. I’ve stated on this site more than once that I wished we’d have gone with the 25’. We ain’t suffering ( I mean, we still own a boat) but I find my self wishing for all that extra room. I’m most interested to hear about how it feels at 30-35 on a choppy day. Or just how nice it is to cruise at 30-35 at a reasonable rpm. The little TR-1’s don’t like cruising at 35 (6500 rpm). Our favorite lake is pretty big and a higher cruising speed would be kinda’ nice . Keep us updated…..

 

[Acard7]

Dude! Super jealous here. I’ve stated on this site more than once that I wished we’d have gone with the 25’. We ain’t suffering ( I mean, we still own a boat) but I find my self wishing for all that extra room. I’m most interested to hear about how it feels at 30-35 on a choppy day. Or just how nice it is to cruise at 30-35 at a reasonable rpm. The little TR-1’s don’t like cruising at 35 (6500 rpm). Our favorite lake is pretty big and a higher cruising speed would be kinda’ nice . Keep us updated…..

I plan to be borderline annoying with all the updates on here, especially with the new 1.9L engines!

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Looking forward to your updates…
If you are going to compare the two side by side so to speak, it would be interesting if you could download a Db meter app on your phone to check sound levels.
And perhaps some real world fuel consumption numbers for the 1.9’s since that info seems a bit sparse..

 

[Acard7]

Looking forward to your updates…
If you are going to compare the two side by side so to speak, it would be interesting if you could download a Db meter app on your phone to check sound levels.
And perhaps some real world fuel consumption numbers for the 1.9’s since that info seems a bit sparse..

Actually own a decibel meter and plan to test this! I will update on fuel consumption too, it will be easier when we go for a week at LOTO since we will travel to different lakeside restaurants multiple days and usually can be 20 nautical miles one way at a time, but I will see how general fuel use is on our home lake too.