Sorry, I am not really a prop expert in this case. 99% of my past experience has been with over-the-hub type props, mostly choppers, but also a cleaver or two for drag racing. I can remember when the tempest hit the streets and it seemed that everybody fell in love with em. Seems like there was a successor to that as well, but I am not sure. Then along came the fury and most seem to like it extremely well. I, too, like the fury.The things you have to balance are low-end torque to get the prop spinning, vs hi-end horsepower which is what spins the prop to drive you to to top-end speeds. If you dont have the torque to spin the prop up, you bog and dont go anywhere. If you pitch the prop so your motor can spin it up easily, then you lose top end speed. It is a real balancing act. For my astro to hit 84 I was spinning a 28p small-eared chopper. With a light load it would fly although hole-shot was pretty pitiful. Add a heavy fishing partner and hole shot almost became impossible, and top speed might hit 60 or so. There are a ton of variables and the art of choosing the right prop is making and accepting trade-offs to get where you want. We did a lot of skiing behind that astro, with a 22 or 23p prop. But top end was not exactly scintillating. To get top end, I gave up hole shot and load carrying.I think the first step has to be to ask yourself “what do I really want this boat to excel at?” In my case, the 25p trophy plus and Fury are pretty close and seem like they can pull stumps. I will keep one or the other (probably the fury, but I want to test both some more to get a real feel for each) and sell/trade the trophy to get a 27p fury which the mercury prop selector suggests given my speed with with 25p fury. But when a heavy fishing partner shows up, I will be running the 25p so we can get to the holes pretty quickly (just not as quickly as I can by myself with a steeper prop).I loved the 2.5l blocks as that is all I ran until I ended up with this 3.0 liter elephant of a motor. But with lots of testing and keeping notes, I figure you can slowly hone in on the right prop. I was fortunate to have a local prop shop where I could make test runs and then exchange. Some places used to have mercury “blue props” that they kept specifically for this purpose. Leave a deposit, take and test, return and get your deposit back. And they obviously hope that when you find that “magic prop” that you will order it from them (which makes sense since they did go to some expense to help you do this.)But if you are looking for a quick fix, you are most likely going to be disappointed. About the only quick fix I have found is where you find someone with the same boat and motor combination and try what they are using if you like the numbers they are reporting. But even that is not 100% accurate as you can find multiple copies of the same BassCat model here, each with a different “best” prop.It can be a lot of fun doing this, but it can also be quite aggravating… AND time consuming. Prepare to get conflicting results since weather changes affect horsepower and torque as well. What works well one day might not get up on plane the next day (an extreme case to be sure, but I have seen it happen a couple of times.)2008 Pantera Classic2014 Mercury Pro XS 200
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