Shorties on 42 1997 Stag Fountain
 

600HP per side do they help or hurt speed? Thanks, T

Don't see why they would hurt speed unless you left the props off! :bunnydance:

Could it be possible to not have enough HP to create enough lift?

that depends on where your drive height is now..fountain usually mounts their drives high so what you want to do is put the drive indicator where your boat is the fastest and measure where the tip of the drive or center od the prop shaft is to the bottom of the boat..tunnelvieion on her may have some insite for you,,he switched his around and he can fill you in on what his did..

Small steps? It helped mine when I installed shorties, but it still didnt get them up high enough I was at ~3" below with shorties but was still able to run 4 blades. Probably the best speed increase per dollar I might of picked up 4mph with tired 502's