20fter in big waves?
 

Ok here goes I have been around boats most of my life but they were like 12' 15' boats so when you have big waves you stay home right?
Now 6 yrs ago I buy a 1980 F20 FORMULA and lots of people tell me she will yake big waves do to the DEEP V design she's a cuddy cabin nice deep V-birth no delta pad decent strakes ect ect SO why is it that the 3' 4' 5' 6' rollers I was in today make it almost impossible to drive on plane without thinking your gona die! And yet it loves 1' 2' chop and I mean loves it!! like were taling nice smooth ride and good speed in the 70 mph range!

Any ideas I would love to hear them.

When you start getting into the bigger rougher water it is all about size and hull design, a 20' boat in 3-5 footers is gonna beat you up either way, you need to get into a 28 or better that is built for the rough, Cig-Apache-fountain-A/T and so on, have somebody with a proper setup take you for a ride and you will know the difference. JMO

Think in scale, your spanning waves in a 20' boat, how hard can you really run a 40' boat in 6 to 12's??? Yet a 40 foot boat would eat up 2 to 4 footers.....

OK I get the jist of the 20' not being able to make contact with next wave coming because it just falls into the troth before reaching the top of the next wave. So does this mean when other guys are boasting that there 19' 20' 21' 22' 23 will eat up 3 to 4 foot waves and they say they are running 50 60 or more they are full of well you know ?

So if I'm hear this right a need to buy a bigger boat to keep boating in lake MI when she gets ruff ?

If somebody is really going 60 in true 4's in a 20' boat... they need this..

You got it! Just be careful not to get caught in the rough stuff very often. I take my 22' Donzi on Lakes Huron and Erie all the time but when it kicks up it is a real handful. There is just not enough length to stay on top of the waves and not enough freeboard to prevent stuffs. Great Lakes waves are not like ocean waves either; They are unpredictable. We wear vests and keep a water tight emergency box on board with the cells, vhf, gps, etc.

Oh, and yeah, what you said about the guys claiming to run 60 in true 4 footers. Maybe on the ocean though because they are more like rollers and spaced out.

Any guy who claims he's bustin' 3-4ft waves on the big lakes at 50mph with a 19ft boat either can't measure, or doesn't have a properly functioning speedo. My old 24fter wouldn't take 4 footers at high speed, my 35 will do it, but its not comfortable. The only thing that will make 4+ft waves easy on you is displacement... ya gotta crush em with weight. That's why you always see the 40ft cruisers doing so well in the big stuff. They just run the waves over.

Ok guys thanks for the information next question is it took a ton of work to get my as we call old resin bucket to get in the 70 mph range how hard will it be to get a 27' 28' to run the same? want to stay with a single engine.

A 27 ZR with a 525 EFI will run over 80. It still won't conquer Lake Michigan on a windy day though.

Went to watch the poker run a couple years back and 5-6 footers kept more than half the boats in the harbor! We watched the boats from the safety of the card stop on White Lake.
The kevlar Baja, Poker Face, ran!

Best bet with that size single to run 70 would be a fountain fever 27 or 29, Powerquest silencer, sunsation 288, donzi as previously mentioned... etc... there are many options... but a 496ho or preferably 500EFI will be needed for power along with a labbed prop on some of the boats. I'm not a big fan of boats that big with a single engine due to the fact that the twins are much smoother and easier to maneuver. The extra motor and drive contributes more weight that is needed to run hard on the big water for longer periods of time. Don't be afraid of twins they can be intimidating but are superior for the type of boating you're referring to. Good luck!