Bob La Londe
Petty Officer 2nd Class
- Joined
- Jan 26, 2004
- Messages
- 196
Ok... In light chop and boat wakes the Cougar does ok. I do need to take a little more effort to make sur I cut waves and wakes at about 45 degrees to do it right. I have found that if I trim down a little bit (not a lot) and let off on the hot foot as I hit slight wakes and then stmp on it as the boat is about halfway acrosse a boat wake I get a pretty good ride. <br /><br />I read an old Bassin' Magazine article about rough water handling, and basically they said reduce trim, but only a little as if you nose down to much you could spear into the water coming off a wave and into the next one. They seemed to think the best way to handle rough water was to quarter waves at planing speed, but not at WOT. Makes sense. Their advice was to (I get confused here) power into a wave and reduce power coming off the wave. <br /><br />If I missed anything please set me straight. I've never run really bad stuff in a bass boat. I've done it in a big v-hull SeaRay before, but that is a rough water boat suitable for offshore running as well. <br /><br />Now, the accelerate decelate thing seems like it will take a little practice, but it sorta makes sense. The same with taking waves at an good angle. <br /><br />Now, obviously the wind will not cooperate so I imagine to get across a big lake like MEad in windy weather with waves you will have to tack back and forth to get where you are going. How do you change directions safely to accomplish this? i.e. Taking the waves at 45 deg then changing to take htem at the opposing 45 degree angle. <br /><br />Also, is there any major differences between taking oncoming waves vs trailing waves? <br /><br />I imagine I will be traveling substantially faster than the period of the waves is cycling. <br /><br />What kind of average speeds do you think I should be running? <br /><br />I know last year at the ABA classic on Lake Mead my partner and I were running a 17'5" (I think) Ranger (my partner's boat) and we took a beating/soaking coming back across the main lake in the afternoon. The waves were running about 3-5 feet. We took it at much slower speeds than I figured was right, but I really had never thougth about taking rough water in a bass boat before. <br /><br />What got my attention was what looked like 20' plus Pro Craft bouncing across the waves tops and doing what I guess as about 50 MPH. He was going up and down, but he was moving fast and not taking any water and spray at all over the boat. At first I figured it was just a difference in the size of the boat, but after asking on a few different forums and reading a few magazine articles I can guess it was atleast partly in boat handling knowledge and skills as well. <br /><br />So, for those of you guys who know how to safely run in rough water with a bass boat. Please take a moment and try to analyze what you do to make this happen. Then take a moment to let the rest of us know. <br /><br />I'll be on Mead a couple times this year. It's like Powell in that it gets rougher everyday in the afternoon and if there is any windyit can get really rough. <br /><br />Hey Roland!!! You out there? You fish Powell with your buddy Mr Yamamoto all the time. How do you handle those wind blown waves and chop? LOL.
