2024 on bass boat fundamentals from Bass Boat Central post by Rick

Copied form a Bass Boat Central post Rick placed on comments around on water accidents increasing today. From a post in the Lounge area: I am reposting this, with edits, from the lower post regarding the possibility of regulating bass boats. I laid this out to teach everyone a little of what goes into a competitive bass boat today. These are things we’ve seen impact how they perform in recent years. While a boating safety course is a good thing, it doesn’t and can’t teach these aspects. People don’t realize that boat control is all dependent on 8”-10” of circular blade area, using only the upper 3/4 of that rotating blade, and 8” of rudder (skeg). Nor do they understand how it works. And no boat safety course is going to teach that. We feel several driving issues are based on bass boat equipment and driver alterations, or changes which occurred at varying date lines. We continue to feel most of the issues today are truly driver error. Many boat drivers today just don’t understand all that’s being held together that’s dependent on one 14 inch circle of propeller bite and an 8” skeg acting as a rudder. That's actually less than 10” of propeller surface holding all of this together. No the hub circle doesn’t count as a 5” round center has no bite. Several circumstances encountered on water can produce negative steering, as a result of low blade torque, and loss of control. That is, if one doesn’t understand what’s holding the vessel under control at speeds. These issues we’ve seen possibly include several incidents that have been referred to as mechanical failures. We’ve also worked several mechanical situations and those generally give warnings, in many cases, before a total failure. And yes we have worked mechanical failures that were truly issues with bolts, connections, nuts, seals, and other aspects. Those are often preventable, though most of us don’t inspect our equipment thoroughly. Just like we have seen loose lug nuts returning from the ramp, often because someone was trying to steal them and quit. So, checking things is important. Now for the topics list: 1. The first newer aspect was the change and addition of front beaching bumpers. These can, and do, pin the bow (nose) under certain situations. A Hamby’s bow protector tends to hang about 5/8” to 3/4" below the actual hull edge in the Vee. The hull then has a running surface behind that which is smooth. Keel protectors that are glue adhesive are thinner and less impacting, though also are less protection. 2. The second was the increase in the use of hydraulic jack plates. As boat operators, most don’t fully understand the skeg relationship to height and control. Ten years ago the use of hydraulic plates began to increase exponentially. In the 1990’s we saw hydraulics on some of the pros boats, generally only for shallow water access and tidal areas. This number has changed dynamically. Today many bass boats we see in operation are tossing water in the air when running on plane, that is from the engine being too high on a loaded bass boat. Many, if not most, are excessively raising the engine and don’t realize it. Even those with manual plates are often too high. To understand what your own boat is doing, have someone photo it on a drive by, at various upper speeds. Those hulls and rooster tails should be clean and about cowling height. 2B. Related to that height is the horsepower, as people raise engines trying to achieve stronger performance. There was an increase in horsepower, in consumer use, as the Mercury Marine 250 Pro XS became a main line retail engine and gained more volume. The HPDI and 250 HO engines followed, and the change in horsepower really took some people beyond where they were with 225 engines. The older 250 XB was not nearly as popular as it was the Racing variant, and the Yamaha 250 VMax (carb 2 stroke) did get some increase in popularity just prior to that. After the 250 HO, 250 Pro XS and 250 HPDI this all changed and many consumers gravitated from 150, 175, 200, and 225, to 250 engines or higher. Anything capable of over 70 MPH will have a learning curve. 3. The third is increased Hot Foot use, often without understanding users tendencies. Which are to release the hot foot instantly in a situation, and then they loose that bite of the 14” prop (8” to 10” of blades) instantaneously. Uses of trim stalk switches and hydraulic plates have increased hot foot use since the mid 2000’s era. Often the engine is also trimmed up, which releases the bow to fall and then the skeg will rise as the bow falls. > The operator is then loosing about 6” to 8” of rudder the skeg has in water. Always trim down softly before backing out of the throttle to retain control. Then there’s the jamming of hot foots when a sharpie or crank bait slides into the mechanism. Or the occasional spring breakage that prevents the throttle from returning to idle. One should absolutely never remove their foot from the pedal, and never remove a toe hook on that pedal. And always wear your safety stop switch lanyard. 4. The Bow weight is the fourth change. It started with trolling motors going from 40 pounds to 50 pounds, and now the new 36 volts can near 100 pounds dressed. The incremental increases are mounting, wiring and more. Even more recently the advent of multiple graphs on the bow, increases bow weight, and then you add turrets on some. Top that off with larger graph brackets, which we’ve weighed some at 45 pounds of additionally added bow weight. Today we can easily be 100 pounds heavier than before Spot Lock and multiples graphs, and we’ve seen bow weights as high as 180 pounds. Just move 150 pounds to the bow and see how that works for you? Yes, all dependent on that little skeg and the rotating propellers that need depth and forward thrust, which increases the ramifications on not understanding all of this. 5. Well, fifth are those fang dangled graphs and GPS we all use. Many don’t know how to turn down backlights in the wee dawn hours. Nor do they even know they can in some cases. Some just fail to do it and suffer night blindness when they return their vision to the dawns horizon from their bright screens. We’ve suspected this one in a couple of fatality incidents, also some recent accidents with injuries. Then, there is the driver looking down and not paying attention to your surroundings. Suffering the loss of bearings, or direction, and those fixed obstacles are not moving, while we are often still moving. Thus we bring an island, buoy or other on water obstacle into our path. Then there those that run at night, and in fog, like they know where they are going. They don’t know what else is moving around them as we don’t have radar. Even if we did have radar, that floater on Sam Rayburn or Lake Fork won’t show up. Which is where starting some events at before daylight can puts all of us running pre-dawn and without visuals. 6. Yes sixth is the later developments of the retail explosion in the lithium battery market. People drop all that weight in the rear, and usually those are the ones who added 75-100 pounds on their bows. There are more midship concerns with dual and triple dash graphs. The feeling seems to be we can now raise our engine to gain performance because we have less weight? This is not the right method. In most daily used bass boats, we don’t surface the gearcase, we keep it in the water. Which again only the lower 3/4 of that prop circle is getting bite, or traction. In reality the boat now runs higher, because you dropped weight, just like running on 5 gallon of fuel, and one person, verses 50 gallons of fuel and two people. If you change batteries to lithium, you should lower the engine to regain the former bite. The hull will often run another 1/4” to 1/2” higher in the rear when weight it taken out. Raising the plate as many do lowers the bite and gains steering wheel torque, which you have already lost bite with the weight loss. Losing weight is no different in a boat than a vehicle. They slow down when they get heavier and speed up when lighter. There are other potential balance effects, though don't forget that it’s all dependent on that 10” of blade surface and 8” of rudder. Which also may require a totally different propeller to get the required handling and connection to the water. Further: We aren’t putting rubber tires on a hard surface like the old days of slicks, as the older crew is remembering traction bars and those big L50 Mickey Thompson’s on your muscle car. We are trying to hold a bass boat that can exceed 4,000 to 5,000 pounds on water, and get handling. Propelling us with 10” of with stainless steel surface at varying flexing thicknesses, and using 3/4 of the rotating circle on top. Then that is the 8” rudder (skeg) that’s short both vertically and horizontal on surface area. All of that is performing in a liquid medium that has virtually no grip itself. Sure it’s not oil, though water is also not nearly as thick as oil. After that it all becomes dependent on the driver to understand what’s happening, which many we find do not. And I’m sure this will be contested by many who know more than any of us about driving, building, setting up, or handling a competitive tournament grade bass boat today. I hope this breaks it down and helps those who don’t understand what’s happening. If this read helps one person to help another, then it gained more than I could ever ask for. Thanks all, Rick