Need prop selection help

[cshyde]

I have a recently purchased 17 ft Bonito Center console boat with a 1990 Evinrude 48 SPL motor. I took it out for the first time yesterday afternoon. I had 4 people in the boat. When I accellerated it seemed to take quite some time to get on plane and at WOT the RPMs were 6000. The specs for this motor are 2.42:1 gear ratio, Min WOT 4500 rpm and max WOT 5500 RPM. I backed it down to 5400 rpm for the test run as I wasn't sure about max RPM until I looked it up today. The current prop is a Michigan Wheel part number 012039 which is an 11.75 inch diameter with 17 inch pitch. to get the rpm down to 5400 - 5500 at wot what pich is recommended? Should I stay with the same dimeter? Thanks. For anyone else lookin for the numbers on an evinrude, after you remove the prop there is a thrust washer underneath the prop nut. Mine was held on by a good deal of grease and when I washed it in solvent the washer fell off revealung the stamped numbers on the hub. Its hell being a newbie.