First Attempt at Surf Wake

[sybrmike]

Finally got a chance to start playing with the surf wake. The 454 engine and 541 prop pulled nicely up and held steady speed. Unfortunately, thunderstorms quickly rolled in & didn't get a chance to play around with the wake plates, speed, human ballast, etc. or even get a board on it. Not much in the way of scale or reference, but any comments from you wake masters out there? I think it's definetely gonna be surfable

1 x 400# rear ski locker (mostly full - started lifting the lid)
2 x 450# under the convertible rear bench
1 x 750# port side floor next to engine
1 x 400# port bow (was missing a plug on the starboard bow 400, so couldn't fill it )

3 adults & 4 kids scattered about the boat

wake plate at ~ 1/2 way up
just over 10 mph (on uncalibrated speedo's)

First Surf Wake.jpg

[wake beater]

u'll be surfin for sure,,now get back out there..

[bmtsupra]

You should have a pretty good surf wake with the bags filled and in those spots.

[Okie Boarder]

That looks pretty good. You'll know for sure once you try riding it. Once out there, try adjusting speed up and down and see if it gets any better or worse. You can also experiment with a little less weight and see what happens. I have 400# bags in the ski locker and under the rear seat, 750# on the floor and a 350# up in the lower front bilge area, plus I'm running 200# hard weight in the bow storage this year. I've played around a bit anywhere from no weight added up front and the two rears half full, the floor bag and a couple people, all the way to all full and 5-6 people and been able to ride almost all of it. Mid range on weight with several people seems to give the best wave so far.

[sybrmike]

So tried setting up for starboard side - not nearly as pretty. Same basic set-up as before, but just swapped the 750 to the chaise lounge behind the driver and remembered to add the missing plug to the stbd bow sac so was able to add some more weight up front. This time I had no crew (just the two daughters - 110# each soaking wet). Had to bump the speed up to 12/13 mph in order to get a lip to form - any slower & it washed out quickly (still uncalibrated speedos, but the same ones as last time so a few mph faster than port).

The boat could definitely handle more ballast (human or sacs). Still had some good freeboard left. The 454 was working hard but steady - does 3100 rpm at 12 mph sound about right? Just didn't seem to want to roll over and list to stbd as well as it did to port.

loaded for port surfing.jpg

Daughter was still able to get up and get enough slack and confidence to throw the rope a few times - although she quickly lost the pocket each time. This was her first attempt at wakesurfing, so I was preaching patience to get the feel - but dang impatient teenager... Regardless, I think the smile says it all!

port surfing 1.jpg port surfing 2.jpg

[WakeSurfCanada]

12-13mph is just way to fast from my experience. in my SS 9mph is the sweet spot for sure. I'm only running somehwere in the 1800-2000lbs
370lbs Ski locker
585lbs Under rear bench (Centered)
400lbs On surfside (Beside doghouse, as far forward as possible)
400lbs Centered under playpen
Was out surfing last night with just 3 of us and had a great wave. 9mph was defiantly the ticket
I also found a small turn toward the surfside as you get going seems to help crisp up the wave and the you can go straight from there

No Wakeplate
Perhaps a bit more weight up front? That seemed to be the thing that really helped out my wave.

Hope this helps.

[kvand347]

IMHO I would take the 450 under the bench on the port side out and place it on the starboard side. I think you are killing your wave by having that thing filled up on the side opposite you want your boat to lean. Your platform is almost evenly sunk which tells me you need more lean. I wish I had a pick of my platform when I'm sacked out. One side is buried under water and the other side is still above water. You really want your rub rail almost touching the water to produce the best wave.

As far as speed, you need to slow it down to about 9mph (calibrated). For me that is like 2400-2600 rpm's...I think? When I first started I was trying to go about 11mph and could not stay in the pocket for more than 15ft. Now that I've slowed it down, the pocket is almost hard NOT to find! Also, it may take about 20 yards for the wave to clean up at slower speeds so be patient with it.

I'm going to start a new thread of wakesurf pics as I think it will help to see what everyone is using/doing.

[kvand347]

Correction on rpm's... Out last night and surf wake was best at 9mph @ 2200 rpm's.

[sybrmike]

Yeah, it felt too fast - but kept playing around with the speed to get the curl to form. Think I need more weight stbd side in general and more up front as well. The port bow 400 fills mostly full, but he stbd bow 400 can't fill full length with the subwoofer under the helm. I was also running with the stbd wakeplate up and port down (I have added custom split wakeplates) trying to force some more list to stbd - may try with more down on both plates to help get the bow down so more curl at lower speed. The 750 fills most of the chaise seat that I added behind the driver, but will try stacking the port 450 over there somehow next time out if I don't have enough crew weight to play with - people are much easier to move around than sacs.

Kevin, I've got a 1:1 vs your 1:1.23, so I'm gonna pull higher rpm's for sure.

[kvand347]

That's true about the trans difference.

I think you will be on to something moving the 450 over to stbd side. If you have enough crew, I would leave the 450 unfilled on the port side and get everybody over on the stbd side. It has been my experience that more weight up front is going to make a smaller wave with more push. More weight in back makes a bigger wave with smaller pocket.