Re: Too Fast to Troll
My Friend has a 22' Criscraft CC straight inboard. 200 HP engine 13X13 prop. Boat wieghs about 3300 lbs. Boat moves too fast when trolling to pull tube and worm. He is running at about 5 mph, needs to get down below 3. Any suggestions on repropping?
I had the exact same problem...my boat, at the correct idle and stock prop, trolled at 5.5 mph....The above advise is good, and I did almost everything here, and now I can troll down to 1.5 mph on my IO...
What I did:
1) lowered idle from 800 rpms to 500 rpms. I actually like running my motor like this (less gas is used, and it sounds better/quieter at idle). This knocked off about 2 mph at idle. It does make cold starting a little tricky, as I have to let it warm up before trying to shift into gear, or it stalls.
2) changed the stock 3 blade 19 pitch prop with a 4 blade 17 pitch. WOT rpm stayed about the same, and the boat got faster out of the hole, but it dropped the idle speed a little (maybe .5 mph). Top speed did drop about 5 mph though.
3) bought 2 drift socks, a small and a large. These can REALLY slow you down, and the large can cut my troll speed more than in half, even downwind. I use the small for divers, etc, and the large for june bugs/worm harnesses. BTW, even the small is probably 3 or 4 times bigger than a bucket.
Tim