dickenscpa
Cadet
- Joined
- Jun 11, 2007
- Messages
- 23
I posted this on a local forum I participate in so I apologize in advance for a double reading.
I have a 14' Tri-hull fiberglass bassboat that I bought on the cheap and fixed up. I wanted to make sure my 4 yr old who just turned 5 wasn't in a fad. My son, wife and I go fishing on the river Saturday morning. A LOT of traffic and I noticed my son had a death grip on his chair so I went back closer to the dock. We ate lunch, went home and I went out by myself later that afternoon.
Get to the dock and there's this guy I briefly met a coupla months ago. He has a big shiny bass boat with a 175 on it. Neither remembered the other's name, but he offered to show me a "secret" spot way up the river. I told him I couldn't keep up with my 1973 40HP. He said not to worry he wasn't in a hurry.
We launch in the backwater off the main channel. Half way out of the backwater he stops and motions for me to come up a bit to tell me something. I put my boat on idle and I'm sitting in his 4 or 5 o'clock position. He finishes telling me something and loweres the hammer on his throttle. Within a split second he creates some kind of seismic and demonic wave and my boat flops hard right and takes water over the side and immediately flops left and takes a bit more water and then you hear the bottom smack the water. To say it terrified me would be a tremendous understatement.
I decided to go ahead and follow him and I stayed right behind him in between the two wakes he produced. The middle was very calm. However, when we got on the main channel, every boat we passed or got passed by created a wake that hit his wake and I was at its mercy.
He finally slowed down to tell me something else. He got angry with me that I wouldn't come up beside him. I lost it and told him he almost killed me back there. I could tell by his expression that it was unintentional and he fell all over himself apologizing. He said he didn't realize he had that effect on my boat. I believe he was sorry but none the less I asked him to slowly pull away from me, I was going home. I had a long way back to the dock and I had never been that far out on my boat before. So much traffic and so many wakes, I was terrified. I know I checked the straps on my PFD a million times.
On a good note. I rebuilt that old 1973 Mercury with the help of you guys on this site. I'm not sure I'd ever touched an outboard before. It ran flawlessly and got me home.
OTOH, what makes my boat so susceptible to even a small wake. The length or is that a notorious trait of a tri-hull? I know a lot of other people with 14' and some 10-12' that have to finesse the wake, but don't have nearly the trouble my boat has. When I know a wave is coming, I position myself at a 45 deg angle and ride it out. None of the other people I know with smaller boats have a tri-hull though. I thought maybe that had something to do with it. If there's any other traffic at all, I can't even make a short jaunt down the main channel for fear of being swamped. I have an opportunity to get a late 90's Lowe welded aluminum that's 16'3". Would it make that much of a difference?
I have a 14' Tri-hull fiberglass bassboat that I bought on the cheap and fixed up. I wanted to make sure my 4 yr old who just turned 5 wasn't in a fad. My son, wife and I go fishing on the river Saturday morning. A LOT of traffic and I noticed my son had a death grip on his chair so I went back closer to the dock. We ate lunch, went home and I went out by myself later that afternoon.
Get to the dock and there's this guy I briefly met a coupla months ago. He has a big shiny bass boat with a 175 on it. Neither remembered the other's name, but he offered to show me a "secret" spot way up the river. I told him I couldn't keep up with my 1973 40HP. He said not to worry he wasn't in a hurry.
We launch in the backwater off the main channel. Half way out of the backwater he stops and motions for me to come up a bit to tell me something. I put my boat on idle and I'm sitting in his 4 or 5 o'clock position. He finishes telling me something and loweres the hammer on his throttle. Within a split second he creates some kind of seismic and demonic wave and my boat flops hard right and takes water over the side and immediately flops left and takes a bit more water and then you hear the bottom smack the water. To say it terrified me would be a tremendous understatement.
I decided to go ahead and follow him and I stayed right behind him in between the two wakes he produced. The middle was very calm. However, when we got on the main channel, every boat we passed or got passed by created a wake that hit his wake and I was at its mercy.
He finally slowed down to tell me something else. He got angry with me that I wouldn't come up beside him. I lost it and told him he almost killed me back there. I could tell by his expression that it was unintentional and he fell all over himself apologizing. He said he didn't realize he had that effect on my boat. I believe he was sorry but none the less I asked him to slowly pull away from me, I was going home. I had a long way back to the dock and I had never been that far out on my boat before. So much traffic and so many wakes, I was terrified. I know I checked the straps on my PFD a million times.
On a good note. I rebuilt that old 1973 Mercury with the help of you guys on this site. I'm not sure I'd ever touched an outboard before. It ran flawlessly and got me home.
OTOH, what makes my boat so susceptible to even a small wake. The length or is that a notorious trait of a tri-hull? I know a lot of other people with 14' and some 10-12' that have to finesse the wake, but don't have nearly the trouble my boat has. When I know a wave is coming, I position myself at a 45 deg angle and ride it out. None of the other people I know with smaller boats have a tri-hull though. I thought maybe that had something to do with it. If there's any other traffic at all, I can't even make a short jaunt down the main channel for fear of being swamped. I have an opportunity to get a late 90's Lowe welded aluminum that's 16'3". Would it make that much of a difference?
