Topic: BCB Hybrid Part 2, 07-30-2016

Ok folks heres a follow up on the Hybrid hull. I went down to the BCB Dealers Demos on Lake Norfork 07-28-2016. Actually planned my vacation around it and stayed on a house boat with my family and best friends family just around the corner from Quarry Marine, where the demos were held. For those of you not familiar with the Hybrid hull see my last post on it. http://www.bbcboards.net/showthread.php ... &highlight= In a nut shell its approx. the bottom 1/4 portion of the 203 Champion hull with the rest of the hull merging into the Puma hull including the Puma top cap. Champion ride, Fishes like a Cat (no tippyness like the older Champs).We get to Quarry Marine and I see a bunch of new BCB faces and a few old ones. I met John Odem of Martys Marine and got to shoot the hay with him a bit (It was nice meeting you John). My dear friend Tom Blakemore drove down with a friend from Springfield to run a couple Cats too. There was an example of every model BCB and YarCraft available for demos with various engine set ups. I start looking around for the Hybrid and see her tucked away by the fuel pumps. I run into Rick and talked with him for a while about the progress of the Hybrid. He said progress is being made but hes still not quite happy with the speeds and hole shot the Hybrid is getting with a load. Theyre still tinkering with engines, gear cases, PTP, Props, Jackplates ect are all being played with still. Over the next several months they have someone working on it hopefully having it ready or real close to being ready for the Tournament of Champions/BCB Regional, Table Rock Lake 2016, then take that additional feedback from the TOC, Dealers meeting, BCB Owners tourney ect ect to decide if it does go into production. Fair enough. Need I remind you that Ive waited over 5 years for this hull to be built, whats a few more months.Rick once again said "The keys are in in it." So I grabbed my best good friend Jim of 30 years and off we went. Jims fished outta my 202 and run it over the years and knows what to expect with it so it was nice to get a fresh body in the Hybrid. Hes more of a multi species fisherman and runs a SeaArk 20/72 with a 1fity Suzuki 4 stroke and not really worried about the high performance bass boats. Anyhow heres what we did.Boat: BCB Hybrid 205Beam: 95Engine: 250 ProXS (with a Verado gear case, if I recall correctly).Prop: 24P TempestProp to Pad: UnknownJackplate: Hydro, (unknown setback)Trolling Motor: 36 volt Motor GuideTemp: High 80s Low 90sWater Temp: Mid to High 80sHumidity: Swamp ass hot.Fuel: FullBatteries: 3 plus 1 for the engine.Livewells: WetPeople: Two big ol Country boysI pretty much did the old Champion demo ride with her. All except the breach turn. Once again it took me a little bit to get used to the hotfoot, hydro steering and blinker trim. I like the hydro steering but ya can keep the hotfoot and blinker trim. IMO.Hole Shot: Right around 5 seconds which was an improvement over the last time I drove it by a good second. No blow out. The Jackplate was already preset in its sweet spot so I didnt mess with it. Trimmed her down, dropped the hammer One-One Thousand, Two One Thousand, Three one Thousand, Four One Thousand = Plane. Not bad. Did this 4 more times. Same result.Slowest Speed to Keep on Plane: 18-22 MPH (No change from Aprils demo run). Wide Open Runs: 3/4 Trim (Trims like a Cat not a Champ) Right at 70MPH, a tad slower than in April (which I ran a consistent 73 and touched 74) with a different gear case and prop. The Tempest didnt feel like it was getting near the lift of the Fury and felt flat under load. Im attributing this to heat, humidity and the dog days of summer compared to spring temps. Other dealers were in the 72-74 range but Jim and I are a tad fatter than them when ya add our weight together.Time to Turn: All Champ. Made the big figure 8s, wrist over elbow at gentle speeds, got faster and tighter, and faster and tighter and a bunch of neck breaker turns. No prop blow out, no slipping or sliding, just biting and turning. Gimme more, gimme more!Ride: All Champ. I stirred up a bunch of nasty old cruiser wakes at low speed then ran thru em from low to high speed. No problem, bring em on. (No Change from Aprils demo run).My thoughts IMO: Again, I truly believe this rig has the potential to be one of the greatest 20 foot bass boats ever made. Rides like a Champ, Fishes like a Cat. The ride is there. The hole shots there. The turning is there. If BCB could just get it to run mid 70s loaded ready to fish itd be a home run. Is it faster than the Puma? Nope. Does it ride completely different, yup. I purposely had Jim jump in the Puma after the Hybrid demo and take a spin with someone whos familiar with running it so he could compare the two. His thoughts? Puma is faster and faster to WOT. Hybrid rode and turned better. Both were a dry ride. He preferred the Puma over the Hybrid. I agreed with him on all points other than I preferred the Hybrid. Different strokes for different folks. It sure would be nice to have the option to pick from.Tight lines my friends - MattLast edited by MMosher on August 1st, 2016, 1:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.