Too Fast Boat!

[Ricochet]

Into the second year using a pair of drift socks to slow down the boat for pulling "meat". Also found that bags in the river hand-lining created arms like Popeye's after a night's fishing. Are the trolling plates that good? And would they be the ticket in the river with the current? Any thought appreciated before I drill the holes in the cavitation plate.

[eyebuster]

My uncle used to use a trolling plate on his I/O, and he seemed to like it. The only problem as I remember was that he used to forget to put it up upon moving to a different spot and bent it.

[SnellTier]

I read one post on there that said they bent theirs too. They replaced it and from then on whenever it was down they would tie a colored cloth to the steering wheel as a reminder to let the plate up before they took off. They said it worked.

[BobE]

I remember my uncle using one and got really upset on a resivour in which you had to be back at 6pm,..he wasn't watching his gas gage and was way down away from the boat landing.With the plate he apparently used a lot more gas than he expected to. He had to choose to come back rather slowly (and be late and face the rath of the gatekeeper) or open it up and risk running out of gas and not getting back and face the patrol boat having to go out,..again not a happy state employee.

[mbrandt]

I have used a trolling plate for many years with a good portion of that time on the Mississippi near Bellevue. They have their good and bad points. Never bent the plate. I never punch the throttle either. It will tell you pretty quick if you forgot to pull it and if you just didn't floor it, no harm done. Just don't get one of those automatic ones. Consensus is they're no good. On the river, you might want to drill a large hole in the center of the plate. Won't increase your speed any, but will provide better steering. You'll need that in the current. Wish I had known that when I used it on the river. You can also do a search on plates here in the archives, especially the boats area. A lot has been written and said in the past.

Hope this helps.

Mark

[hgmeyer]

My mechanic...whose opinion I value and generally follow...is "anti-trolling plate". His objections are related to what happens to older large hp carbed 2 cycles that idle a lot... they carbon up and can shorten their life considerably. His advice is find a "cheap" kicker. His "cheap" kicker is any kicker that costs less than a 6 cylinder rebuild!!!!

[Brad]

He's lucky he only bent the plate. Sometimes the cavitation plate breaks instead.

Also, I've heard the automatic (spring loaded) trolling plates are supposed to make using reverse a pain (i.e. they "spring" down when your trying to back up). Haven't used one myself so I don't know how true that is.

Alot of times, getting the right trolling speed is merely a matter of prop selection and over (or under) trimming the motor while trolling. And if you got trim tabs, lower 'em. Between those two to three items, I've never had to use bags or trolling plates.

[Ricochet]

The steering is definately the problem. Very hard to keep the bow on a "straight" course running the river on an angle! The bags actually seem to slip the boat mid-ship like trying to steer a car with a tongue heavy trailer. Thanks for the comments so far... hope to get more.