While not out there that particular Shoot Out, I can speak from other similar LOTO events. There probably were occasional wake patterns with an 8' difference between the trough and the peak. It's not waves, but wakes from all the thousands of boats leaving the no-wake zone and getting on plane. Keep in mind there are more and more cruisers and yacht's being driven like big runabouts, or with a bow high plow throwing the biggest wake that hull can. Put all this together in a narrow lake with a lot of sea walls, and you have a mess. 4-6 footers most every weekend during the season in parts of the lake, and if he says 8 leaving a shoot out, I'll believe there were some.

Yea, I hear ya, but hell even the Jet Express on Lake Erie barely throws a 8 footer.... I know the washing machine deal, Sandusky channel on Lake Erie is BAD.... + we get the normal square waves on Erie, 4 ft high, 4 ft apart... I still think 8 footer is pushin it a tad..8 footer is a big ass wave...

Damn...if the only place I had to go boating was a lake with 8 foot waves I think I would sell the boat and find something else to do. That LOTO sounds like a terrible place. I feel blessed to only have occasional 5"~6' waves near inlets during tide changes. Our seas in the coastal Atlantic here normally have a 2:1 or 3:1 set ratio that puts you on top of at least two crests with a 23' or larger boat.

Hell..when we have 8' seas no one in their right mind goes out unless it's a life or death rescue or some other horrible event!!:eekdrop:

I'm going agree with most of you and the 8' wave thing. I was caught in 8-10 footers on my sailboat in the middle of Lake Michigan several years ago. It took 60 mph winds, 4 hours and 80 miles of fetch to produce these waves. Lake of the Ozarks could never produces such waves, it just doesn't have enough fetch. With an 8 to 10 foot wave I could have my entire boat (32 feet) on the backside of a wave with room to spare on both ends. Once I made it over the top I would come surfing down the face and smash in the the backside of the next. It was an experience I never want to experience again! A 8 foot wave is huge and no way are you going to be on plane in a lake in such waves. I've also seen some large boats take off and I've never seen one kick up even a 5 foot wake. Think about it, it a 50 foot boat made an 8 foot wake it would swamp itself when it stopped, the transoms are not 8 feet high.....

Endeavour32: Your experience on a sailboat sounds scary, but that has little to nothing to do with water conditions on LOTO. You are allowing your local experience of Michigan lake water to influence your views of other waters, and in this case that does not work.

LOTO waves have nothing to do with wind 99% of the time. They also have nothing to do with fetch. It also has nothing to do with the spacing of the waves, as it is very tight with no pattern. It has everything to do with wakes in confined areas with vertical sea walls to transfer the energy back into the boating area.

The OP (who claimed there were 8' waves, not me) was addressing a particular part of the lake, following a particularly crowded event, at a place where all these boats were getting on plane. While probably very few to none (other than maybe the 50'+ Carvers, Blue Waters, and SeaRay's) are capable of making a wake close to 8', when you get wakes running into wakes, colliding and making troughs, I'm willing to trust that there were 8' differences between the low and the high next to each other at certain points in that watery mess. He never claimed the entire lake is like that, and you need to stop thinking of Great Lakes when you think of LOTO, just like someone from the coast needs to stop thinking of the ocean when they think of the Great Lakes. These are different waters with different causes of their unique conditions.

As far as your comment about a 50' boat swamping itself from it's 8' wake if it made one: Oh come on. That is a straw man argument, that is also full of holes in its own logic.

Hey Chart, PM me. I started this thread. I ended up with a 1986 F302. Getting new trailer, cover, and minor checks by Wilkes Marine. Can't wait to get it out to Catalina Island in a few weeks. Send me any photos of yours. The upgrade thread on this forum is great. I need ideas. I will respond with photos or a link so everyone in the forum can see. PS got a smokin deal on a new aluminum trailerfrom Kokopelli trailers in Phoenix, AZ. They are associated with Platinum trailers in Florida.

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I have been to LOTO and while the waves were not 8 foot there were areas were I would say we dropped down 6' and that was outside party cove and there were no "big" boats there at the time just a butt load of smaller ones. I was blown away that a lake could get like that. I can also see it getting like Chart said if you had a few of the larger boats running down the lake in some of the narrower areas.

6/8 no differance, we have a narrow area of river and on a hot sunny day it can fet pretty bad ive see 6 ft rollers off the back of one of them tanks easily and when the waves bounce between shores the can become violent and tws the can gave some crazy holes in the middle, when we great lake guys/ocean guys say 6/8.ft waves we think of the huge swells we often ecounter especially here on the east end if lake erue

I have not been to all places to boat... But friends have.... I am told there is nothing like Lake Erie.... None other I know for sure Lake Erie can hand you your azz if your not watching....