Trayson's DIY "Supra Surf System" (SSS) modeled after the NSS

[trayson]

So then we went on of course to deploy the gates with the boat equally weighted.
Again, sorry for the pic quality. I never thought about the sun.

3 inch blade deployment equal weighting


I believe that this is the 1" deployment with equal weighting. Not 100% sure though.


Goofy side with 3" blade deployment

[trayson]

And finally a couple surf shots.


..



Russ thought it was a pretty decent wave on the goofy side. He didn't feel my "decrease in push" criticisms but it was also his first time on my boat... Sadly we had to cut his run short as the water in the gas made it so we couldn't continue to pull at surf speeds.

And here is a picture from 10 days ago with a slammed/listed boat with my 750's double stacked on the surf side and water running at the rub rail halfway up the hull while underway.


Sadly our testing got cut short because the surf starboard side gate had the unfortunate side effect when deployed of shooting a little spray of water right at the gas tank breather vent. And I ended up with the old "water in the fuel" thing and my engine wasn't happy with me under load. I guess relocating that vent has just moved WAY up on my priority list.

In summary, I feel like these NSS style blades can get a surfable wave with an evenly weighted boat. It's very comparable to the quality of wave I'd get with listing my boat with my two 750's double stacked and the top one 1/2 to 3/4 full. What I did feel is that my wave seemed a little lacking in push compared to what I remember it being with a heavily listed boat. BUT, the usability and drive-ability and comfort of being in the boat is VASTLY improved even with 2 huge sacks taking up the floor. So I'll continue to refine it and dial things in and overall I'd call it a success.

Is it perfect? of course not. Does it make my direct drive have a wake comparable to a perfectly dialed in v-drive, no. But it's giving me more options and is certainly something that opens whole new doors of opportunity with my boat.

[brain_rinse]

Why did you reduce the speed? Do you think that had anything to do with your lack of push?

[trayson]

So, I relocated my fuel breather and drained the 22 gallons out of my tank and changed my fuel filter. Filled with new gas and once the bad gas was out of the lines, we were good to go.


Again, we filled the 370 tube sack under the rear seat and had the pair of 750's on either side of the doghouse. The boat sat mostly flat with a slight (couple inches) list to the port. We fine tuned with the placement of the rear seat spotter.

Bottom line is that I won't go back to listing. Today I had all the push I needed. I was riding my Ronix Caption 5'8 because just as we were leaving the dock my Koal illumanati dropped and cracked the tip of one of the tails and needs some fiberglass repair love.

I was able to ride way further back in the pocket. I was able to carve and shred the wave just fine. We were able to drop our surf speed from being in the 10 to 11 range down to being between 8.3 and 9 mph. The boat isn't working as hard and isn't slammed as much. We had some big rollers go by us and took no water over the stern. We have zero issues with dunking the nose either. With the ballast full, we can easily chill out and have lunch and be COMFORTABLE in the boat. Also, we can drive sitting down. It was bad enough before that I either sat on the top of the backrest of the chair, or just stood up to drive. Swapping from regular to goofy was literally a 10 to 20 second changeover.

Since we're not having to double stack bags, we were able to get 2 ballast pumps going at the same time to fill the 750's while my reversible impeller pump took care of the tube sack under the rear seat.

There is no adverse handling of the boat when going back to get the rider. If you turn against the blade, you kind of notice it but honestly it's not even something you notice unless you're looking for it. The boat comes out of the hole just fine and the wave is clean as soon as Perfect pass has you at surf speed.

We'll get some pics posted up but I would do this again in a heartbeat. Some of you might poo-poo what I've done, but the overall enjoyability of our boat just took a huge leap. I'm going to chalk this up as a success.

None of the pics are on my phone, so I only have a quick mirror shot.

[mmandley]

I think you have used some great innovation and took a risk that not many would with your design, I for one would love to try surfing behind your boat this summer. I got plenty of time off so I don't mind the drive LOL.

[trayson]

I think you have used some great innovation and took a risk that not many would with your design, I for one would love to try surfing behind your boat this summer. I got plenty of time off so I don't mind the drive LOL.

Let's do it! I'm off all next week. But I don't think your sabatical starts by then.

[trayson]

Here are a couple better pics of the wave. Now, is it a wave that tops a $40k to $100k vdrive? Probably not. But for a 1992 direct drive, I'm pretty happy.



This is only the 2nd time I've rode goofy. I'm a newb at it. And obviously regular is better on my boat. But FWIW, here's the goofy wave.

[uniwarking]

Looks like you've got a good design started. I have similar concerns with the hull strength, material and 1/4" hardware. I really don't know how much force these see... I guess the wakeplate or trim tabs don't take a whole lot of support. I'm tuned in, good luck!


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[trayson]

the stern is flat from about the top of my swim platform down

Then it's probably work well.

dumb question, but are you sure the hull at the rear can support the forces that will be cast upon it from what this is going to be doing?

surfgate puts a much different stress on the hull than the nautique nss, or moomba flow.

We'll find out. In a lot of ways, the baseplates are actually going to function to strengthen the hull. adding reinforcement in my opinion.

Wow this type of ingenuity astonishes me! Good luck with the project and I am excited to see how it turns out for you. Since you drilled these holes into your hull I guess you could say you're invested in "making it work" one way or the other. I am interested like berg asked to know about your hypothesis regarding the added hull drag/force.

I guess there's only 1 way to find out. The other guy that did it on his malibu is having it work just fine and he didn't even through bolt his...

Is the HDPE strong enough for the force of the water or will it break off, the OEM use Aluminun For a reason I assume.

Great write up and mod BTW..

The guy on the Malibu forums is using 3/8" HDPE for his blades and it's working just fine. I'm using 1/2" so mine is thicker. At least 2 of my bolts are on the swim platform backing plate. 2 are where there's extra hull material for the swim platform and the rest are near the corners where things would naturally be stronger.

We shall see...

Looks like you've got a good design started. I have similar concerns with the hull strength, material and 1/4" hardware. I really don't know how much force these see... I guess the wakeplate or trim tabs don't take a whole lot of support. I'm tuned in, good luck!


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Someone has to be the innovator and risk taker. I'm sure you all feel better knowing I'm doing it to my boat while you know yours are all safe and unmodified. Bottom line is that I am willing to push the envelope and I feel pretty optimistic about how it's going to pan out...

[trayson]

So, as Washington tends to do in the spring, it rained tonight off and on. And there were times where it was coming down heavy so I had to figure out something to allow me to work on my boat. So I moved my offset patio umbrella and it worked PERFECT.



Picking up where I left off last night, I took the blade that had the holes cut into it and made the lines for the channels. (the top actually needed another channel, but I fixed that later).


So I mounted everything up and sealed it all with 3m 4200 fast cure. That stuff is sticky but after my experience with the 5200 on my transom lights, I learned to be careful with it. Here's a pic of the inside of my hull. I made 10 new holes. some of them have the bolts going from the outside in, and some of them are going from the inside out.