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I have numerous boats in the past 20years, most have been I/O.......this is the first inboard for me. So its a bit of learning experience with the steering. What is the reasoning for the boat only to go to the right in reverse? This makes no sense to me......its not difficult to drive, but just more out of curiosity is what is killing me. Thanks
It's caused by the rotation of the prop and the position of the rudder. With your outdrive, turning the steering wheel turned the entire drive unit, including the prop, giving you steering in reverse. With an inboard, the prop is fixed. Since the rudder is aft of the prop, it has little effect when in reverse.
Welcome to the inboard world, reverse never works at the dock.
Other than that, inboards are the cats meow.
When docking, always pull in at a 45 degree angle with the dock on your right. Once the nose almost hits the dock, throw a quick bump into reverse and the tail should swing right towards the dock. You might have to pump it a few times forward to the right and back into reverse, but with a little practice it's very easy to do. You can pull in with the dock to your left, too -- but this will come later. ;)
Like everyone has said, it takes a little getting used to and it is because of the prop rotation and the fact the rudder is aft.
On another note, where are the pictures of your new baby?
Wotan's right. With a bit of practice you can parallel park these boats on a dime. If you turn a hard left backing up you can offset some of the effect of the prop spin and back up nearly straight. The other handling attributes of an inboard more than make up for backing up - compared to an I/O driving a Supra is like driving a car with power steering.
You will also learn to control your boat near the dock using your transmission, and not your throttle. Be patient, and only use idle power. You can spin your boat 180 degrees in only slightly more than your boats own length by appliying full wheel input, and then bumping the transmission in forward gear (idle throttle) momentarily, then returning the transmission to idle. This short blast of idle power over the rudder will begin to turn the boat without moving it forward very much, resulting in a spin as the angular momentum continues the turn (spin) while the boat loses its small forward intertia. If you spin to the left, you can contiue the spin when it dies down by bumping the transmission into reverse momentarily, as the stern will travel to the drivers right (on boats with left-hand rotating props), continuing the spin to the drivers left, while the boat will revers slightly to return to its starting point, while completing 360 degrees of spin. You'll notice that most of the boat turning/spinning occurs after the transmission is returned to neutral.
This spin manuever technique is important for getting away from your trailer in a narrow launch slip way, because you can not back straight out (as the boat stern will swing, and steering is not effective in reverse) without potentially hitting an obstacle. The spin manuver will allow you to spin the boat in tight quarters, and exit the launch area traveling forward with full steering control.
All inboard style craft (including the largest oceanliners and super tankers (you know, real boats)) share your boats handling traits.
Inboards are more challenging to master, which makes them more fun to operate. But fortunately it does not take long to get the hang of it. A challenge is that operators of the vectored thrust boats (outboards and stern dives), do not always understand or respect the inboard boat's special needs. You may get some razzing around the boat launch, but don't let that get you flustered while loading or unloading from the trailer. Just enjoy the fact that they probably do not have clue.