Another surf thread 242 Launch

[Kma4444]

So like I mentioned over in general discussion, we got our 2012 242 on Friday.



We had a plan for trying different setups for surfing to begin with the stock ballast. We tried just the stock rear bag full on surf side, which for us is goofy. There was a ride-able wave, well, the wife is the real surfer so she did all of the early testing and SHE could ride it, me, probably not so much. But is was obviously not very large. It had a nice shape just not much push. Of course this came as no surprise as 400 lbs in the rear corner of this stretch limo is like tossing a hotdog down a hallway, not much impact.

We went through some different setups using the stock ballast and the approximately 2000 pounds of bags we had from surfing the 86 Sunsport. The best wave coming with as much weight as we could stuff in the rear compartment surf side and under all of the seats in the back surf side. We also had all the stock ballast on board. the wave is big, powerful like you can't imagine and long. The end of the day yesterday I got to ride the final setup and it was all I could do to keep the board from gnawing at the rear of the boat. It just keeps pushing you forward. I could ride as far back as the rope would let you then the curl would come over and grab my back leg. A better surfer could certainly go back even further.

We had a Ronix rope on the tower but I don't know how long it is. It was way back, I mean WAY back compared to the 86 even with the 2000+ pounds we carried in it. I would guess we had about 1500 over stock ballast all on surf side. Couple of cool things, the boat leans very little, the rub rail is still 6+ inches out of the water and the bow sits low enough that I can drive and look through the windshield. The Zero Off cruise is wonderful and keeps the boat right on speed. The steering is feather light and it goes where you point it. A couple times I walked to the back of the boat while underway, NOT recommended for obvious reasons, and it just kept going straight.

The only complaint so far is the FM reception is really poor. The little wire antenna under the front is inadequate for our area. I'm thinking a small antenna hidden under there will remedy that. Wouldn't worry about it and just use music on media but the local station does promos on the lake and we like getting free shirts etc...

I will get pics up and videos soon.

[Tmoney]

Great looking boat..where do you guys live? We are in Cincinnati and boat at Lake Cumberland in Kentucky about an hour south
of Lexington.

My daughter surfed easily with 98% port side full....nothing in the front was best. Seems the calmer the water the better too. I can
go for a while but not as long as her...she only weighs 90 lbs and I'm 175

How long is your board? We have a Hyperlite Broadcast 48. Thinking the bigger size 54 might be better for adults 150 lbs and up

[Kma4444]

Ok so here's a video. Took me a while and it's not even good quality, the lens was fogged a bit. But it does an OK job of showing the wave we have so far. I have sent drawings to Fly High to get a custom sack made so soon we will have it dialed!!!



We, well my wife could surf with just the surf side rear full but we had the extra bags and wanted to see what we could come up with. I'm sure we will be completely happy with the wave this thing makes when we get done playing. The wife even said she liked it better than the one behind the competition Enzo she surfed down in Florida at an event. That was wonderful news.

We have several boards, she likes her skims at the moment and I am using one of her Triple X surf style boards. I am pretty sure it is 4'8", I am about 180lbs.

They really do build a pretty boat. We are in Central Georgia and go to Lake Sinclair.

[Tmoney]

How fast we're you going? Our wake looks similar at 9.4 to 10.2. Every time I got really going with slack, I would end up practically
in the boat or at least on the swim platform

[Kma4444]

That was 10.8 probably. I had her speed up a bit to 11.1 and it was all good. Still don't have that all figured out just yet we were so ecstatic to have such a good wave so easily that we left a lot of options unexplored. Our wave would for sure shove you right up to the boat if you let it, LOTS of push there.

[jdub667]

Very nice boat!!! Let me know what you figure out on the ballast settings and speed per I am trying to find the best setup as well. I run 10.5mph it seems to be the sweet spot but still playing with it as well. So what upgrades you planning on if any?
I do love the new prop I put on mine even with full ballast it will pull and plane out no problem so it was a good upgrade, however Iam about 6000ft above sea level.

[Kma4444]

I will keep this updated with what we try and the results. I'm guessing your boat at your altitude and ours where we are end up having very similar power output. We have the ACME 1325. It is a 14 x 14.25 I think and if anything I would like to try a prop with more pitch, IE. less rpm. Might not be ideal but it would be a fun experiment. This setup turns 600 or so rpm more than the way we ran our old Sunsport and I would like to see how slowing the prop down would affect the wave. I know comparing the two boats is akin to comparing a hatchet to a chain saw but it is the only frame of reference I have to use.

We don't wakeboard much and it is decidedly low intensity when we do so no added ballast is necessary. Getting up on plane should never be an issue for us. I tried one WOT run just to see and it would go 40 mph. I have no need to go any faster, not why we got this boat, but again, it would be interesting to see what a higher pitch would do.

We need to contnue to compare notes, not enough folks talking about the big Supras.

Thanks

[kjkimball]

We surf our 242 both sides. We have settled in on this set up:

1100 sac in each locker (use appropriate one for goofy or reg)
500lb (10 each 50lb bomb wake ballast bags) on the floor in same corner
11 to 11.5 depending on rider.

The other thing I did was switch to the OJ 5 blade prop. Better for everything including surfing with a nicer wake and quick hole shots.

Our lake is shallow which cause us some grief. So, what we do here may vary from what we would do on a deep lake. We do have a 24 ft deep lake we travel to on occasion and the wake is huge there. On our lake, we have a good long pocket and a waist high wave.

2012-08-11 12.46.06.jpg

[Kma4444]

That's great info. Would love to see any more photos or even a video of it.

I have measured for and am having made, a custom sac that will fill the rear compartment and go under the seats up to the driver's seat. We usually just surf goofy so for now that's all I am doing. I will remove the divider under the seats so the bag will fit. It will be around 1700 lbs plus I will be stuffing one of our old bags under the cooler area behind the driver's seat and plumbing it into the main bag. Guessing maybe another 150-200 lbs with it. It will of course be plug and play so that will be nice.

Interesting that you don't run any bow weight or off side weight either. We will have to give that a try. We thought we tried draining the left side bag once but didn't check and it hadn't drained. Explained why it was hard to tell the difference. We're figuring out how to use the new boat, slowly!!!!

I'll look into the 5 blade prop, I've heard opinions both ways on it but yours is the first review I've read on a 242.

If 24 feet is your DEEP lake, how shallow is yours???? I'm spoiled by ours I suppose, we're almost always in at least 35 feet of water. Our lake isn't considered all that deep for around here, less than 100 feet I'm pretty sure. Lake Lanier where I grew up is over 200 in places. When we went to the surfing competition in July down in Ocala, the middle of the lake was 19!?!?!?!?!?!? That was shocking to me, it was a good size puddle too.

[kjkimball]

Yeah, we are about 20 miles south of where the surf contest was in Ocala. Lake Dora/beauclair/Carlton on the Harris chain is where we play most of the time because it is 5 minutes from home. Dora averages about 9ft and has a few 10-12 ft deep spots. Carlton is 11 average with a 14ft section. We also go to Dalhousie now and then and it is 20-24ft deep just has a really crappy dirt ramp blown out by the bass boat guys. Central Florida is pretty flat so it is rare to find a deep lake here.

On the 5 blade OJ, we didn't just 'feel the difference' and force ourselves to like it because we bought it. I am an Indmar dealer and have the diacom engine test system. So, we hooked the computer up to the engine and ran a set of tests with the stock prop, no rider, wake, surf, etc. Various loading conditions. We then pulled the boat, swapped props, put gas back to full and repeated the tests with the 5 blade. Performance improved in all aspects except top speed.