Looking for Suggestions - unable to go "ropeless" (wireless)

[Moor]

If you go over to wake9 there is a great vid about going ropeless. The "superman" technique helps a lot. I have a sunsport direct drive and put 250 inder the rear seat and 1100 olong the surfside with zero in the bow. On my liquid force fish 5'6 I can surf for the length of a whole song...
I will admit that it takes a little more balance to do the same with my 4'9 broascast, but I certainly can freeride with either.
Are you all standing on the board with emphasis to the toe edge?

Maybe try zero on the non surf side???

Where is your water level when underway? Mine has water at the rubrail all the way to the rear cleat.

Trayson, your not running ANY ballast up front? Do you have a pic of your surf wake? On my 1988 Sunsport im running 500 in the ski locker, about 600 across the floor between rear seats and the dog house, 500 in the bow, and sometimes another 500 along the side (depending how many passengers are on board). Id love to run less weight, but i cant get a nice wave without front ballast. I'm riding the same 5'6 liquid fish as you, and also a 5'0 obrien alias. I'm almost 200lbs, so maybe i need all that wight to push my fat *ss around lol

[trayson]

Trayson, your not running ANY ballast up front? Do you have a pic of your surf wake? On my 1988 Sunsport im running 500 in the ski locker, about 600 across the floor between rear seats and the dog house, 500 in the bow, and sometimes another 500 along the side (depending how many passengers are on board). Id love to run less weight, but i cant get a nice wave without front ballast. I'm riding the same 5'6 liquid fish as you, and also a 5'0 obrien alias. I'm almost 200lbs, so maybe i need all that wight to push my fat *ss around lol

I run typically with:

• 370 tube sack on the surfside floor next to the doghouse
• 750 fat sack on top of it, with as much of it in the rear seat as possible
• ~250 tube sack under the rear seat across the back.
• spotter in the center/rear or on top of the fat sacks.

In the following pics, I had the above setup with about 200 pounds of kids in the observer seat. the spotter was 150 and driver was 130.

I am 5'10 and 170.







Here is a video that goes with the above pics:
http://youtu.be/ozrMElT46CY

When I was running with only 1 adult and my son, I changed it up and put a small 150 pound sack on the middle rear seat. I made my 50 pound son lean against the doghouse and flag from middle/rear.


Smooth water helps. And the wake breaks and gets foamy if we run in water under 10 feet. With the above setups, I'm running water just over the rub rail all the way up to the first cleat when underway.

Here is a video where I think I still had the 150 in the cooler, but I had extra people to offset it...
http://contour.com/stories/supra-sun...oing-surf-duty

last night we were running with

• 370 tube sack on the surfside floor next to the doghouse
• 750 fat sack on top of it, with as much of it in the rear seat as possible
• ~250 tube sack under the rear seat across the back.

and the wife's back wasn't feeling good so she sat on top of the fat sack and my buddy who is 235 was driving, but would stand as far center on the boat as possible when driving (we have perfect pass, so throttle control isn't necessary once we're underway).

With the same setup as above, and me driving and my 235 pound buddy on the Fish, he was able to get some decent freerides. He has to work it a bit more and my skill level is higher, so I'm honestly not sure how much of his increased effort is due to his 65 extra pounds vs. my increased skill/experience.

There was another time when we were out and we had driver, adult in observer seat and the 3 sacks as normal. When we had ~200 pounds of kids shift to the bow, it KILLED my wake. So we've been just running with no bow weight (small anchor, toolbox, deflated tube, life jackets) and our small cooler with some beverages and a bag with some dry snacks and towels in the "cooler" storage compartment in the open bow walkthrough.

Oh, and I don't have a center ski locker (not sure if you were talking about a rear trunk or a center floor type locker). I have the rear trunk, and that's filled with wake ropes, life jackets, wetsuits, etc.

[trayson]

While we always have the bag under the rear seat filled, the MAGIC happened to our wake when we double stacked the bags on the surf side. We used to run the 750 on the floor on the surf side next to the doghouse and the 370 on the floor between the rear seat and engine (across back). That was 'okay' but no where near as good as the current setup.

This is how it used to look:






But honestly the current setup of double stacked bags on the surf side is way better and not running the front bag has been awesome since the wife is WAY happier being able to put food/beverage/towels into that cooler storage compartment.

[Moor]

Thats a pretty nice surf wave Trayson. I never thought about stacking the bags on the surf side, interesting. The only time i ran with no weight in the front was when we were still learning to drop the rope. i had to add weight in the front because our sweet spot was so small we were having a lot of trouble staying in it, so we fattened it up with 500 under the front seats on the surf side, and we were surfing ropeless. I'm definately going to try your currect weight placement when i get home. Where are you running your wake plate? up down or in the middle?

[trayson]

I believe it's all the way up. I've never messed with it.


Of course we porpoise quite a lot when surfing (you can see in the one video of the boat)

[kvand347]

As Trayson said..stack your bags as close to the back and on the side your want to surf for the best wave. No need for extra front ballast. Use people if you have a lot on board.

[trayson]

As Trayson said..stack your bags as close to the back and on the side your want to surf for the best wave. No need for extra front ballast. Use people if you have a lot on board.

Yep, a pic from tonight...



Picture of how slammed the boat was at rest... (look at the "SUPRA" letters in my sig pic, and then compare to what you can see of them in this:


And here's my buddy freeriding... all 235 pounds of him. I was driving and my wife and he son were at the stern. no bow weight... Yeah, he's REALLY forward on the board, but he's riding it. FWIW my (im)Perfect Pass wasn't being very cooperative. It was having a tough time keeping a stable speed for us despite the SMOOOOOOOOOTH water.

[MJHKnox]

I have the 2007 SSV 22'.

I wanted to try to stay away from bags outside of the compartments.

Got rid of the 400# and went with 750# bags. Could also go with #1100 if you wanted - Not sure the 1100s will fill all the way.
New pumps help fill the bags quicker. More $$, but DID NOT REGRET THIS.
Move people all on one side.
Wake Plate up.

Try the longer board, >5'. The LF Fish or CWB Ride are good options that will not break the bank.
If you want to spend $$ on a board, buy and Inland Surfer Red Rocket. Will float 'big boys', but will also cost >$500.

Everyone is dropping the rope. Staying in the pocket is another thing. That requires some skill for the people that do not have it to start with.

Mark

[HyperCVAD198]

Extremely Late Update:

Wanted to thank everyone for their suggestions. We did end up biting on a new board (a Hyperlite LandLock 5'10) right before a long Labor Day weekend at a cabin. (Side Note: It was REALLY nice to be able to walk down and fire up without having to drop off the trailer, etc. ) The difference between the 4'10 and the 5'10 was night and day. We were getting the "push" that we expected rather than having to fight the entire time to stay in pocket. Thinking back, it's amazing how we were able to get all those people up on the shorter board, because the new board makes the process so much easier. We're well aware that there's not much shredding to be had on the longer board - but that's just fine for the ladies of the group (who were all able to get up on the weekend - and one has even gone ropeless/wireless for minutes at a time!)

Key factors (we felt) to our success:
1. Longer Board - easier up and more "push".
2. Speed - as we started keeping the speed between 11.5 and 12.5 mph and noticed it was also making it easier to stay wireless as well.

We'll still be looking to do some ballast upgrades, but think that we're at the point where we can comfortably spend a season enjoying everyone getting up regularly and starting to advance our techniques. (we were goofing around on the shortboard while on rope with 180s, etc).

Thanks again,all!