Nose Cones Again??
 

I am considering nose cones for my 1998 32' AT. Marine Kinetics 600's with low water pickup Bravos. My drive height is fairly high with a notched transom. 85-88 mph depending on load/conditions. I have tried 1" spacer which improved cruising speed but not top speed. The boat is generally unresponsive to trim at high speeds, hence the spacers.

I read through the posts on a search but have a very specific question. Hydromotive cones seem to be successful at getting mph but the drive/nose cone has to be modified to install according to Hydromotive. Teague has "Leading Edge" nose cones (PN 003LOW) that are built for the low water pickup Bravos. Is the hydromotive necessary or could I use the Teague "Leading Edge"??? The Hydromotive is the rounded tip and the leading edge is the pointy tip.

I just ordered a set of Hydromotive
cones, I'll have everything back together
in a couple of weeks, I run in the same speed
range you mention, I'll let you know how they work.

From what I've heard the Hydro cone works better
on boats that need a good amount of positive trim.

One thing I can tell you from past experience
is that the LWP bravo is probably costing you some mph.

I ran a back to back test on my LWP's against
side water pickup lowers, on my old boat ( low 80 mph boat)
and the side pick up lowers were 1.4 mph faster.

JT, I have a friend who ran back to back test on a single LWP vs. side. The LWP had much higher water pressure than the side pickup but we had no way of bleeding it off. With the headers on that boat we suspected that PART of the speed loss was excessive water exiting with the exhaust and thus increasing back pressure. This was decided over several beers and never given much thought again.

Seems some time back I heard of a board member that installed a pressure gauge and found it very high. Installed a dump valve and gained some speed. Now with several more beers we could postulate that if the dump valve were installed rearward...

One side benefit of dump valves is less drag on the impeller, possibly increasing its service interval. Another is more water is seen by the oil cooler if your valve is on the downstream side improving your oil cooling. Likely not to make much difference but interesting for thought.

Is Bobs nose cones still in biz, They looks pretty good

Bobs indicated that they worked mostly on outboards.

I've got a Bob's nose cone I'll sell if someone wants one...

I like the nosecones in your avatar!