I'm back.. Last summer experience and looking for feedback.

Mike_G

WOT did you say??? 

Harr de harr harr.   I had to say it.  -=Mike G.

raybo3

Nothing beats knowing for sure if your boat can get to WOT by going WOT. I am sure VV7 is good but you cant always tell by gauges. Does VV7 tell you that you may have too much growth on the bottom? Maybe I am just old school........ Just say'n

Dream_Inn

well, I'm a bit torn between both Raybo and MTs comments.  I have VV and yes, you can figure it all out with going WOT.  Growth on bottom, well, with VV you know digitally the exact rpms for the speed and fuel burn, if it changes, then something such as growth is affecting it.  Although, I do think it is good to go WOT once in a while to just 'get the bugs out'.  I probably only go WOT twice a year for a minute or two, but could do it a bit more.  Not sure about every other time out though.

It's sure fun to listen to you all go back and forth and Handy's comments thrown in to try to stir the brew!  (Oh, and bottom growth??  what is that?  must be something for those without lifts?  ever hear of that Handy?...yeah, me neither)

jme097

Hahahaha

Handymans342

Dream, you are finally thinking like me 

Mike_G

No bottom growth here.    -=Mike G.

Michael T

I have nothing against going WOT once or twice a year for a minute or two as DI says but why more than that?  On an 80 degree day with humidity around 60% and "normal for my boat load"  I will run between, 32 to 34 MPH at 3400 RPM.  If there are current or wind factors that will change. So I always know very close to how the boat should be running at normal, for me,  planing speeds.  With the VV 7 upgrades of 2015 I can view or print out any data I want,  from the day the engines were first started  -  so why beat my engines if I don't need to.  BTW long before I had any VV type electronics I could "feel"  if any of my boats were "off". I didn't need to go WOT to figure that out!  :-) 

Dream_Inn

Handymans342 said:

Dream, you are finally thinking like me 

I believe, you are thinking like me!

Handymans342

No but I copied you 

rasbury

I'm surprised how fast the larger than 270's cruise- I'm probably running 3800rpm to run 25-30 mph but two power plants obviously make a big difference- in a lot of ways!

Michael T

Ras, on a bigger cruiser that has twins,  if you size the engines right you can get amazing,  for a boat, performance in speed, planing and fuel efficiency. This is particularly true  for Rinkers as we are already starting with one of the fastest cruiser hulls on the industry, so it makes sense,  to me,  to match the best engine combo to it!  When the Admiral wanted to get into cruising it was a new area for me. All my life I had been a "go fast" owner, so I knew exactly what to expect from my engines and boats. But not so with cruisers which were a new area to me.  So,  going to cruising I spent the summer before "interviewing" anyone who would talk with me about cruisers. I wrote the comments in a log which the Admiral and I used to option our first cruiser. Since we are talking about engines here I'll mention the number one comment I was told (99%) of the time - get the biggest engines that you can afford that will fit into your engine bay. As an example -  when we were looking at buying a new Rinker 360 we interviewed owners of Rinker  350s and 360s.  Every one of them said get the big blocks. Many of them had twin 350s or twin 377s and they said the engines had to work far too hard,  we're difficult to get on plane and got a lot worse MPG than the the 496s,  which were the big block option from Mercury at the time.   Every owner with twin 496s that we spoke with  was very happy with their choice. Now when we boat with people who have a T 350s or T 360s our T 502s outperform their boats in every aspect. So,  that's what I've found out.