Northwest Fishing Reports

I have a fish and ski boat thats mostly set up for fishing with trolling motors and such but I also love to have some fun with a tube and wakeboard and ski's. I know if buy that 150$ hydrofoil stabilizer from cabelas I will save gas cause my boat takes a while to plane out with the 125hp merc. But is it going to hurt my wakeboarding?? Is my wake gona get too small to jump??? I know this is a fishing forum but I do see a lot of fishing boats doing some boarding and skiing.
THanks in advance

You just trim up the drive and keep the rpms down so the nose stays high

I wish I could offer any decent advice on hydrofoils. I have heard they really help you plane faster, but I don't know if that might come at any cost (your wakeboarding wake).

I have a multi-purpose boat and the year it was made (1994) kind of pre-dates wakeboarding. Or the big popularity of it, anyway, and the design of wakeboard-specific hulls. It's designed really to not put out a big wake, for a skier, so I also find myself challenged make the best of what I've got on hand.

I can get a pretty decent wake by trimming up to get the nose up in the air, as PapaMike suggested, and then getting all my available extra weight (bodies, coolers of beer, etc) up front to push that nose back down again and push out a fat wake. I'll start out trimmed all the way down, to better climb out of the whole, but as soon as my guy is up I start trimming up and slowing down.

If you wakeboard enough to justify the cost, a wakeboard tower or ski pole is a great way to get weight distributed better for a better wake (think of the tower as a big lever, and the higher you can get up that lever and apply pressure, the more you can exert and more efficiently), and of course more air when you jump! My tower ran $1000 (Monster Tower), but I had a universal, easily-removable ski pylon from Air Boom (look up "Universal Air Boom" on www.airboom.com) in my last boat. It was a 17' 1971 Jolly Roger with a 140hp I/O in it, and the weight distribution was fantastic for that little boat. I also just saw a used universal tower on Craigslist the other day for $500. They're out there but you'll have to look for them.

Something else you could look into though is a different propeller. I switch between a 3-bladed 21-pitch for cruising days when I want top-end speed and better mileage, and a 4-bladed 19-pitch for hole-shot torque and quicker planing. If you're not averse to changing out the prop depending on what day you have planned on the water (I can change mine out in 5 min), it's a great way to get the performance you want on the fly. Or, maybe you can find a prop that covers both scenarios.

Hey good luck!

Aqua, I have a cabelas hydrofoil that has the trolling plate missing that Id sell for $40 to ya. Every single one they made ended up cracking at the retainer pin so the plate always falls off of them, so don't buy a new one. Come get mine, use it as just a foil, and enjoy.

They only generate a little extra lift, so it won't alter the wave pattern (wake) of the boat. The wave train is much more closely related to the displacement of the boat and the hull length than it is the amount of psi of lift on the transom.

To get the best of everything, add a tower or pole to the boat (this generates upward pull on the wakeboarder and gives the effect that TC states above), add the foil out back so you can pop out of the hole much faster, and lastly either pack the boat with buddies or add a ballast tank of some sort. The fine tuning comes after you get a consistent amount of weight thats normally in the boat, at which time you can tune your prop to the optimal rpm range.

If you do all this at Long lake, I can help you dial it in.

E