32 fountain props
 

Need a little advice on prop selection. Boat is a 32 Fountain, no steps, running 27p hydros spinning out. I feel the boat runs very flat, maybe it's suppose to and I'm just not use to it, maybe not? I feel it needs more bow lift and would like to get a pair of bravo props to help with that. Rpm wise, what would 26p and 28p bravos vs my 27p hydros do, increase, decrease.... Thanks!

28 Bravos will spin pretty close to the same rpms as 27 Hydro's.

If you're running regular Hydro Q4's, they are stern lifting props. Bravo's or the Q4X's will give more bow lift.

Thanks griff, that pretty much what I was thinking, just wanted confirmation I guess.

I have the same hull and would be curious to hear the results if you change them.

Just picked up some bravo 28p but it's that time of year and she's already in hibernation. I will let you know in the spring though. What motors/props are you running? Spinning in or out?

I have 502 MPI's with 26 Hydro Q4's spinning out. Came from the factory this way according to the test report. I have always wondered if spinning in on this hull would make any speed difference or just make docking harder as most say. Most 32's I read about here have steps and they all spin in and do go slightly faster, but not much talk about ours I have found so I am very curious. I was planning on swapping them to spinning in this year but had a top end let go which ended my summer way too soon. What power does yours have and what speed did you see with the 27's?

I have hp500s and 27p hydros but only spinning them to 4600 at 74.5 but after talking with whiplash from here with a 94 32 and hp500s he was spinning about the same as I am and switched to 28p bravos spinning out and had them labbed. I think he's flirting with 80-82 now if I remember correctly. He was just starting to play around with them when we talked. I have no hydraulic steering and my steering has about 2" of play in it, so it gets pretty loose feeling without the tabs set at 4 right now, but it rides very flat regardless. Steering is getting fixed this spring so I'll have better data then.

I'm no expert but I figured with the little extra power you had with the 500's you should be able to spin those to 5k and be just shy or be able to break 80 or so. Do you have the performance report from Fountain for it I'd be interested in seeing what it did from the factory if I was you. Mine came with hydraulic steering but I hear it's no fun without it. I saw on FB swap a full setup that was pretty cheap if you are looking... I will be overhauling my engines this winter (possibly to around 500 specs) so when you have some more data please share!

Yeah I was told by previous owner it spins them to 4900, had old gas at sea trial and didn't want to run WOT so only brought it up to 4000.... Long story short it's had about 3 full fresh tanks through them now and only runs 4650 tops, but I do run the tabs at 4 and drives at 3.5-4 or she's a REAL handful, so possibly I'm just plowing water being the nose is buried. I do have the performance report, just got it from fountain last week. Motors aren't stock, didn't start making them til 94, and I have no idea what year they are. Report shows 502 mags, 25p mirage, 5200rpm at 74.5mph, tabs at 3.2 drives at 5.4 on an 85* day 6" chop. I frequent powerboat swap shop as well. My plan right now is to get steering fixed in the spring and run it next summer, top end rebuild come September and motor guy says 4 weeks, so hopefully test first couple weeks of October, then over the winter install hydraulic steering. Right now it just seems to ride very flat and almost out of control at WOT, or really anything over 70. I was very surprised when talking to whiplash that his motors were basically running the same as mine were until he changed props.

Dave, how fast are you running?