Three blade vs Four, for pulling a BIG skier

[repeat2]

I have a 17 ft aluminum Smokercraft w/ 115 hp Mariner, a 13x19 pitch prop. Overall it works good and within the mfg RPM range. My question is hole shots and pulling a big guy on skis out of the water. Is the four blade 17 pitch the answer or should I stay with a three blade and drop to 17 pitch?

I would like to try a four blade prop for the overall performance they claim to have. They also say when going from three to four blades you should decrease pitch, is that necessary?

Thanking you in advance for any info you can offer me.

 

[craze1cars]

Re: Three blade vs Four, for pulling a BIG skier

For holeshot on pulling a skiier, you don't want to just be "within" the range, you want to be at the PEAK of the range. indeed adding a blade usually requires dropping pitch to maintain RPM.

Without knowing your exact RPM data, I will guess you will most definitely need to drop in pitch if you want to change to a 4 blade. If your current 19 is a 3 blade, then a 17 in a 4 blade is a good educated guess.