Hi All I hear that ski teams are running very small pitch props with the stock ratio gearbox. I understood Mastercraft's powerslot helped by using a taller pitch prop and a reduction gearbox to achieve the same effective pitch, but more traction and more efficiency. I think it makes sense that a 13 or 15" pitch prop won't have as much bite on the water as a 19" prop. A zero inch pitch prop would just be a disc which spun round and round and it would have no grip at all. There would be a limit the other way, I guess when the blades go past a certain rake but it would be more than 30" I guess. So, has anybody tried swapping out their gearbox and running say 2.2:1 gear ratio with a taller prop for the same effective pitch? How was pulling power - did you get noticably more traction? Greg
Yes, I have driven a triple 150 E-Tec boat with 2.25:1 gears. When the big pull was done for 4 4 highs in 2006, Mad-City's boat was used with triple 225 E-Tecs. WI Rapids Aqua Skiers boat was fitted with the high altitude gears from the V4. It had 15 pitch props and would top out at about 38 mph all over the rev limiters. Ultimately torque is torque and despite being geared down it simply did not hold a candle to the trip 225s because of displacement differences. It did make a better/easier/more forgiving pull but we were able to accomplish the same thing by going to 13 pitch props on our triple 150s at the end of 2008 when we started pulling 30+ consistently. Plus the 2.25:1 gears won't hold up real long to a V6 small block vs the V4 they are typically offered on. You can also ventilate props to help them spin up faster on the low end. We did this a couple years ago to induce a bit of cavitation when pulling 4 prefab pyramids ( 24 people) with twin 250s. Mercury's props have an advantage in this area because of the PVS vent system they use.
