MOBILEMERCMAN

Is it in fact "free wheeling" or cavitating at 3000 while you wait for it to hook up? Or is it bogged down and laboring? Two completely different situations.

Chris Sunkin

The x looks fairly deep- maybe 2" below the bottom. That shouldn't be your problem. I'm going with too much prop for the horsepower- especially since you're hitting those speeds at such low RPM.

You need to stick a pair of 8-71's on those 540's and put that transom hardware to good use.

kvscarab38

QUOTE=LeeS;1949239]That one brought back enough memories to get me to reregister here. NOT a Larry Smith Scarab but still an unusal boat. I bought one in very similar circumstances and it was rigged right beside that one in the race shop that John Connor, Don Pruitt and Gus Anastasia set up right down the road from Wellcraft in Sarasota. Both my boat and this one were built by Wellcraft with interiors, instrumentation and paint but no other rigging. Connors shop then did everything else to race boat rigging standards. Mine was also tabbed hull to deck as I asked for it, not sure about Rick's. Extra care was done at Wellcraft to scrape resin out of the molds on these two. Rick's was done in Kevlar but I chose glass. Connor did not like Kevlar back then as he had some bottom splintering on Betty Cooks boats. So I listened to him. He also tipped me to the fact that Wellcraft Kevlar boats were only 400-500 lbs lighter than glass boats as they used only a few very thick heavy layers of Kevlar as opposed to the 14-15 very thin layers in a Larry Smith boat. He assured me I could get the same 40 pound out by them gong to the plant and making sure all the extra resin got scraped out.
The one pictured of Rick's was a standard 575 Merc with #4's at the time it was new. Mine had Arneson ASD8's and Connor built 540's with about 650HP. Rick's boat ran about 80 and mine closer to 85. Unfortunately Rick's boat looks like everthing is still the same so I can't imagine what kind of shape the motors and drives are in, it looks like it still has the original merc bypass mufflers that caused so much water to get in the engines they were discontinued after a short run.
One more fact, you could get a full interior in a Larry Smith, VERY nicely done and simple and light weight. I priced one out before going with the Wellcraft and that is exactly what it looked like as far as the other boat pictured here.
Rick's boat was NOT a brochure boat either, mercury did use a shot oif the engine compartment in many boat magazines to advertise the 575's.
Sorry for the long blast from the 80's but it's amazing to see a boat pop up that was right beside yours for many weeks. And no, I have no idea where my boat is, I sold it to a guy who boated on Lake Superior in the mid-1990's. If anyone ever encounters an 87 38 KV with ASD8's on it I'm sure that is it. 1988 was the last year for that model and I was later told I was the only one who ever rigged a Wellcraft boat that way. There are some Larry Smiths out there with Arnesons though.[/QUOTE]

props i believe are cavitating more throttle just means more rpm and longer to hook up I'll try moving sticks back and forth as sugggested have to wait till ice is gone just have time to ask question this winter thanks to all the help.

MOBILEMERCMAN

Some of the boats I've raced would slip the props like yours. With some practice they would come up pretty quick with a couple of handfuls.
Thanks for history. I would think many things have been tried over the years.