Re: Where Are Steering and Controls Located?
Sasto ? The rudders may look small, but these boats are actually amazingly maneuverable, and responsive to the rudder, they will turn sharper and harder than just about any other boat. You can get your fingertips wet when holding the gunwale in a sharp turn. As to the amount of deadrise, ?. Absolutely none. The bottoms are perfectly flat, sort of shaped just like a big oversize ironing board with a little bit of rocker in it. The reason that between hull speed (about 6+ knots) and about 20 knots is useless is that they really have to climb up a hill so to speak to get up on top & planing. These are REALLY beamy boats. At 16 feet they are a bit over 6 feet in beam (my antique wood skiff is 6?7? in beam, a lot for a 16? boat). They are sort of shaped like a big bathtub. Believe it or not, At around 12 ? 15 knots these boats will throw a wake that will rival your large boat?s wake. Also, the stem is pointed so far up toward the sky that you can?t see a thing in front of you. They are fine up to hull speed, then you open it up to pop up on top as quickly as possible, then once you flatten off at something like 25 ? 30 knots you can back off down to about 20 ? 22 knots where they will be just staying on top. The foot throttles respond pretty much just like the accelerator in a car. The throttle in my ?glass skiff is hydraulic, most of the others I see seem to be of a Teleflex cable type. You do have to do some feathering when the boat and prop come clear of the water so you don?t over-rev the engine & blow it apart. Within the past 20 years or so the racing guys have worked on slightly changing the shape of the bottom of the boats so they ride a bit flatter & stay in the water a bit more (less rocker in the bottom). My ?glass skiff was built in 1969 & raced in 1970 (Nat?l champion that year), and has more rocker as was typical for the period. As a result, she does a good bit more porpoising & bouncing around than the new boats. As a whole, speed skiffs run very much like a flat stone that you skip across the surface of a pond. If you enjoy a bit of a thrill, they are an absolute blast to ride in, and when down at hull speed they are very sedate and conservative feeling & looking. Very stable too with that Chevy V8 down low in the middle. They hardly move when you step aboard.
