Re: Prop selection ??
The reason you were told to read the sticky was to determine what the wide open throttle rpm is on the engine at this point with whatever prop you have available (hence the baseline). It may be the prop you have is already optimum and changing it will only hurt performance. Your engine needs to operate at or very near the top of the manufacturers recommended WOT rpm band. If it goes over that you need a prop with less pitch. If it cannot reach that limit then the engine is lugging and will eventually develop problems. Since you have no way to determine WOT rpm, I suggest you install a "Tiny Tach". These are about 30 bucks and are easy to install. Only then can you optimize your setup. Without that RPM number you are only guessing at what the engine is doing. As you said, you want the power to tote the load but you don't want to over rev when empty. Those demands are at opposite ends of the performance spectrum and you can't have it both ways. You need to determine which way you run most of the time (loaded or empty). If loaded you prop for power. If empty you prop for a compromise between the the two or you prop for empty and accept the performance you get when loaded. You should now realize the importance of a tach in your quest for a solution to a problem that may or may not exist.
