javelin renegade 19 with evinrude 150ho engine need help with chinewalking

[ethand]

just purchased this boat which I think was used more for pulling skiers and tubing.sets on a 8" jackplate.i tried two different props.one was a raker the other a raker ll.i know the raker is 14 1/2 x 24.not sure what the raker ll is,maybe the same.but I do know that the boat chinewalks bad with either prop.maybe not as bad with the raker.i will say there was little gas in the boat today and I was by myself.so maybe that was part of the problem.but where would a good starting point be to get the chinewalk out of this boat.thanks for any help

[OldTimer57]

Some basic advice:

(1) tight steering. No slop. If you can grab the back of the motor and move it 1/2" or more, that needs to be corrected. For cables, tighten things up. For hydraulic, bleed the air out. Any slop will make it much easier for the boat to start walking.

(2) balance reasonably laterally. If the boat sits with a significant list to the driver's side, it is going to be easier for it to fall off of the pad to that side and start the walk process.

(3) At this point, stop with tweaking. Take the boat out, do NOT trim very much, just enough to get the bow up as you don't want the bow plowing and let a wave cause a sharp turn (bow steer), and then slowly go to WOT. Probably won't walk, but probably won't be near as fast as you expect. Once the speed settles down, tap the up trim and watch what happens. If it stays stable, tap up again. Keep tapping until it starts to misbehave. First, tap the down trim to get the chine walking to stop (don't stop it by chopping throttle, that will drop the bow and if it is off to the side you are going to turn RIGHT NOW. Best to avoid that.) Once you get it back under control, tap up and repeat. Now you have two tries under your belt, you have trimmed down again to stabilize the boat but still at WOT. Now think about what happened. It probably behaved the same both times. Did you notice the bow twitch to the left or right? Both times? If so, tap up again. But this time you know what to expect so at the expected "nose twitch" apply a touch of opposite steering BEFORE it twitches. You will now run just a bit longer at WOT but it will do it again, possibly to the opposite side. Repeat again. and then get it back under control again. Did it do the same thing both times? If so, you are getting closer. Tap up again, do the first automatic correction, but now be ready to anticipate the next twitch and correct that before it happens. Now you are getting into the "tick-tock" pattern that will control your boat. And after some seat time, you will get it to settle down without having to tap down. Time to tap up a second time, and repeat. In general, the higher you trim, the less boat you will leave in the water, which improves the boat's penchant to walk (and increases speed of course). And at some point, as you trim up, speed will begin to fade a little. But the tendency to walk will still continue to climb. If you want, keep going, even though you are losing speed you are learning to control your boat.

Always remember, "trouble -> down". Think about it like "If I get in trouble, I am going to tap down instantly or even sooner". Down is your friend to stop the problem. But after more seat time, you won't need the down, your motor muscle memory will take over and the boat will run without any walking, and you will wonder "what changed to make it stop?" The answer will be "you". :)

Learn safely, but learn.

[ethand]

thank you very much oldtimer57

[cham13]

just purchased this boat which I think was used more for pulling skiers and tubing.sets on a 8" jackplate.i tried two different props.one was a raker the other a raker ll.i know the raker is 14 1/2 x 24.not sure what the raker ll is,maybe the same.but I do know that the boat chinewalks bad with either prop.maybe not as bad with the raker.i will say there was little gas in the boat today and I was by myself.so maybe that was part of the problem.but where would a good starting point be to get the chinewalk out of this boat.thanks for any help

I have this same boat and setup, except mine has a 6" jackplate. I had the same issue when I first got the boat. Seat time and proper prop to pad measurements and adjustments is the key for this boat. This boat and motor combo will flat out run for what it is!

[Tom G.]

Chine walking is a natural occurrence on a big performance rig. It is the spinning and torque of the prop trying to push the boat off of the pad, and thus unavoidable. You can't drive through it, you need to learn to control it before it happens. You can minimize it, but it will never fully go away.

JR19 can give you setup pointers, and then the best thing you can do is let someone who knows drive your boat while you watch and feel. Start slow, practice and bump the trim up slowly until you get the hang of it. If you get the wobblies, trim it down and start again. Practice, practice, practice.

[r015]

Some basic advice:

(1) tight steering. No slop. If you can grab the back of the motor and move it 1/2" or more, that needs to be corrected. For cables, tighten things up. For hydraulic, bleed the air out. Any slop will make it much easier for the boat to start walking.

(2) balance reasonably laterally. If the boat sits with a significant list to the driver's side, it is going to be easier for it to fall off of the pad to that side and start the walk process.

(3) At this point, stop with tweaking. Take the boat out, do NOT trim very much, just enough to get the bow up as you don't want the bow plowing and let a wave cause a sharp turn (bow steer), and then slowly go to WOT. Probably won't walk, but probably won't be near as fast as you expect. Once the speed settles down, tap the up trim and watch what happens. If it stays stable, tap up again. Keep tapping until it starts to misbehave. First, tap the down trim to get the chine walking to stop (don't stop it by chopping throttle, that will drop the bow and if it is off to the side you are going to turn RIGHT NOW. Best to avoid that.) Once you get it back under control, tap up and repeat. Now you have two tries under your belt, you have trimmed down again to stabilize the boat but still at WOT. Now think about what happened. It probably behaved the same both times. Did you notice the bow twitch to the left or right? Both times? If so, tap up again. But this time you know what to expect so at the expected "nose twitch" apply a touch of opposite steering BEFORE it twitches. You will now run just a bit longer at WOT but it will do it again, possibly to the opposite side. Repeat again. and then get it back under control again. Did it do the same thing both times? If so, you are getting closer. Tap up again, do the first automatic correction, but now be ready to anticipate the next twitch and correct that before it happens. Now you are getting into the "tick-tock" pattern that will control your boat. And after some seat time, you will get it to settle down without having to tap down. Time to tap up a second time, and repeat. In general, the higher you trim, the less boat you will leave in the water, which improves the boat's penchant to walk (and increases speed of course). And at some point, as you trim up, speed will begin to fade a little. But the tendency to walk will still continue to climb. If you want, keep going, even though you are losing speed you are learning to control your boat.

Always remember, "trouble -> down". Think about it like "If I get in trouble, I am going to tap down instantly or even sooner". Down is your friend to stop the problem. But after more seat time, you won't need the down, your motor muscle memory will take over and the boat will run without any walking, and you will wonder "what changed to make it stop?" The answer will be "you". :)

Learn safely, but learn.

I've driven/raced 100mph+ V bottom boats 13'-20' for 50 years, you have given a great explanation , Great job !

[JR19]

just purchased this boat which I think was used more for pulling skiers and tubing.sets on a 8" jackplate.i tried two different props.one was a raker the other a raker ll.i know the raker is 14 1/2 x 24.not sure what the raker ll is,maybe the same.but I do know that the boat chinewalks bad with either prop.maybe not as bad with the raker.i will say there was little gas in the boat today and I was by myself.so maybe that was part of the problem.but where would a good starting point be to get the chinewalk out of this boat.thanks for any help

Good advice has been given so far. I will comment more latter, right now I am cramped for time...couple questions...cable or hydraulic steering and if you don't mind me asking are you anywhere close to south central Ky.

[ethand]

Good advice has been given so far. I will comment more latter, right now I am cramped for time...couple questions...cable or hydraulic steering and if you don't mind me asking are you anywhere close to south central Ky.

the boat has hydraulic steering and I live in eastern ky.thank you and all the other posts.you guys are the best

[shafer22]

slightly adjust prop to pad

[JR19]

I will give you a rundown of my past experience...I bought the boat in 2001. It had a 150 Ficht and no jack-plate. I ran a 24 Raker and the prop to pad was 4". If I was by myself and I had less than 1/2 tank of fuel it would start to walk around 58 mph (GPS) I could make steering corrections and drive it to 62 on a regular basis if I were by myself. GPS history had 62.8 as my fastest speed. With two people, live-well full and a decent load of fuel there was zero chine-walk and speed dropped to 59-60. When loaded light I had to "drive" it to get max speed. What I done was put light pressure on the steering wheel like I want to make a very small left turn. When moving the steering wheel to the left I could feel the steering torque a small amount. The torque felt is the steering turning to go left against the prop that is spinning right at 5500 rpm. Anyways the movement I made was slight. I would best describe it as moving the wheel to the left from 12 o'clock to 10 o'clock. The movement was not sudden. I just applied pressure against the torque of the prop. Once it felt neutral I move the wheel back to 12 o'clock. The movement from the time I move to 10 o'clock and back to 12 o'clock lasted about 2-3 seconds. Not long (about 2 seconds) after I got back to 12 o'clock I went right back to 10 o'clock for 2-3 seconds. I know that may sound like work but once you learn the feel and rhythm your're actually doing it and don't realize your doing it.

In 2014 I re-powered with a E-TECH 150 HO. The HO model pushes the 10% rule so its more like 165 horsepower. I installed a 6" jack-plate and put a 24 Raker II on my new motor. I also installed two Minn Kota Talons. The weight of two talons and the mounting hardware is around 125 pounds if my memory is correct. I figured the extra weight of two talons and the brackets plus the addition of a 6" jack-plate would would help reduce chine-walk because in the past the more weight I had the less my boat wanted to walk. I had the dealer set my prop to pad at 3.5" because from what research I had 3.5" was a good setting for my combo. Chine walk wise my boat acted exactly like before. I did have hole-shot issues so I ended up raising the motor to 3.25" and getting the vent holes enlarged on my Raker II. I ran my 24 Raker and my 24 Raker II and both performed very close to each other. Still to this day when light it wants walk around 58 or above. I have had it to 64.94 light but that was with my old 24 Raker. My 24 Raker II can only get 63.4 light but it has a much better hole-shot so I run the 24 Raker II...same steering adjustment...apply a small amount of torque to the left...once you feel it get neutral go right back to home position. As for trim on my rig trimmed all the way out is actually slower than 90% trim. I can be at 100% trim with no more left and my speed will be something like 62.1...I can bump down the trim slightly and speed climbs around .5 - 1.0 mph

If your having issues light then fill the live-well all the way. The extra weight will help. Learn how to counter act chine-walk with steering adjustments. As you get better you can run solo with a light load. Remember corrections to the steering are slight corrections. Less trim is better than full trim.

[ethand]

thank you big time jr19

[JR19]

Chine walk occurs when a boat does not have enough of the pad in the water to remain balanced. Hence the reason why trimming down cuts out chine-walk, you lowered the boat so it has more pad surface to balance on. I will give a strange analogy but hopefully it makes sense...if your pad was as sharp as the letter V then it would have to be perfectly balanced to remain up right. Now if the V has something spinning on it to the right 5500 rpm it would want to fall over to the right, hence the left had steering correction to counter balance the V. The steering wheel acts like a balance beam for a high wire walker. When center of gravity gets off balance they use the beam to counter act the off balance. With a boat the off balance will be to the right because of prop rotation. If nothing is done when the pad gets off balance it will first fall to the right, bounce back to the left and then bounce back to the right. The process just keeps bouncing from side to side over and over. This is called chine walk. The steering wheel is your balance beam. It can be used to regain balance.

Here is a good video...this guys set up has cable steering...its been my experience that cable steering require a little more "snap" or "faster" movement than hydraulic steering. I have found with hydraulic steering its more of a move slowly left instead of a snap to the left. Anyways I am sure each boat is somewhat different on how to make steering adjustments. You can see in the video from start to 1:30 he is riding along making corrections with one hand like nothing is going on. At 1:50 until the end he purposely holds the steering wheel straight and lets it start to chine walk. Then he shows how easy it is to get it back under control...good video to learn how to counter steer for chine-walk.

[OldTimer57]

I have noticed one significant thing over the years. As a fast boat accelerates from zero to max, it goings through several stages.

1. Displacement mode. Boat is plowing through the water, hull below the surface of the water. High drag, low speed.

2. Plane speed. Boat is now on top of the water pretty much, but the hull is irregular in shape so parts are still below the surface of the water, but if you were to look and measure, in general the two back corners of the boats (commonly called chines, which is simply any sharp angle in the hull) are running on the surface, the pad is below the surface, and maybe the front 2/3 of the boat is in contact with the water. Much more efficient (and fast) than displacement mode.

3. next stage happens as you trim up and speed increases. Now you have basically a triangle of the hull in the water. A triangle with one vertex 6-8 feet from the transom, the other two vertices are the rear corners of the boat. Less hull in water, but pad is still below the surface. Boat can't chine walk here because both corners are in contact with the water. Many boats stop here, they don't have enough power to go any faster and can't produce enough lift to get any more of the hull out of the water.

4. Reaching 60-65, you are now at the point where maybe the last 3-4 feet of the pad is in the water, and the two outside corners are just barely in contact with the water. You can't get a real chine walk here, but waves can induce the effect by bouncing one corner up, pushing the other down. Water pressure will push that one back up, and inertia will roll it right on over so that the other corner drops below the surface. This is often an unstable condition that will not stop unless you do something.

5. The ultimate sees the boat rise up further out of the water so that the only part of the hull in contact with the water is the pad, usually the back 2-3 feet, maybe 1 foot or less wide. Now you are balancing a 2500-3500 pound boat on that small little platform, and things begin to go wrong. Looking at the back of the boat, the prop is rotating clockwise trying to drive the boat forward. This clockwise rotation of the prop follows Newtonian physics with the "equal and opposite reaction" stuff. So the motor tries to turn counter-clockwise which is transferred to the hull. Get it balanced on the pad and the motor tries to make it lean to the left. And when it does, all hell breaks loose if you don't do something quickly. The left back corner (chine) hits the water, which causes drag on that corner. That pulls the bow of the boat to the left and induces a left turn. Now inertia comes into play as when you turn left the boat naturally wants to now lean to the right aided by the left corner "bouncing" off the water. Now it rolls right, drag goes up, bow swings right, and this is again an unstable state where it can get worse and worse with every "bounce" until the hull swings so far to one side or the other that you "hook" the thing when the prop angle becomes too severe to hold the bow up and the bow hits the water and you turn RIGHT NOW.

The "hands off" boats never pass stage 4. Because once you get to stage 5 it is NOT hands off. You could not ride a bike if you locked the steering straight ahead. Any more than you can ride a boat balanced up on that tiny square of hull. So to get to the real upper end of performance, you have to recognize the boat falling off of the pad (note it will NOT always fall off to the left, caused by motor torque. It CAN fall off to the right caused by the boat listing to that side due to weight distribution (driver is on right, console is on right, just for starters). So if someone says "my boat is hands off" they are REALLY saying "my boat is hands off because it never gets all the way up on the pad..."

All it takes to lick this problem is (a) understanding what is going on and why; (b) then figuring out what you have to do to prevent that from happening; (c) then practice enough that you can do it in a timely manner before it gets out of control.

One other note. As you trim up, you do two things. (1) you increase the angle of attack of the hull with the water, which causes the hull to "fly higher" because of increased water pressure under the boat; (2) you expend part of your potential forward thrust to lift the bow up to increase the angle of attack. You win some and lose some here. You win by having less wetted area, you lose by using power to lift the bow rather than drive the boat forward. The ideal trim angle is zero degrees, the prop shaft is exactly parallel to the direction of travel (hence with the surface of the water). 100% of motor thrust is driving the boat forward. If your boat is bow heavy, more up trim will be needed to lift it. OR you can increase set-back, which drags the center of gravity to the rear since that heavy motor is now farther aft. With the perfect setback, zero trim will be max speed. Not many get to optimal. And, if you go to far, you run into the same song, second verse. Now the angle of attack becomes too high, and you get into a lift - stall - lift - stall condition that is commonly caused porpoising. To combat this, you have to trim down, and when you go below zero degrees, now you are wasting motor thrust holding the bow down rather than driving the boat forward.

So lots of things to get it in the "goldilocks zone" (not too hot, not too cold, just right). And, of course, this is less of a problem with the allison/stroker/bullet guys since they have enough power to drive the boat up into the 100 mph range where center of gravity becomes a point of interest only, rather than a necessary and critical thing to control.

Last point is that chine walking is dangerous. Some boats just have an annoying wobble that reaches some aggravating point but no further, while others will go bam-Bam-BAM-HOOK if you don't take action. Hook often means ejection. Or else lots of bruises. And can mean death. You always want to keep it firmly under control. And with enough seat time, it is just like driving a bicycle. Hard to explain how to do it (turn wheel to get bike back under you when you start to topple to one side) and once you get it down, you can ride a mile keeping both wheels on a 3" wide paint stripe with out thinking about it.

Interesting topic. Difficult to deal with at first. But anybody can lick it with some effort and practice.

[J Risco]

Ha, that video is me. It def shows how very minute corrections in the beginning keep the boat going nice and straight. Looks like it doesnt even want to walk but then at the end you can see how quick it will get walking if you arent preventing it in the first place.

[drake322]

Ha, that video is me. It def shows how very minute corrections in the beginning keep the boat going nice and straight. Looks like it doesnt even want to walk but then at the end you can see how quick it will get walking if you arent preventing it in the first place.

Looks like a normal day at the office for a 285. LOL.

[J Risco]

Looks like a normal day at the office for a 285. LOL.

Haha. That was the first boat I ever drove that walked. First day I was sure there was something wrong, then I read up a bunch and went out the next weekend with a full tank and learned to drive. After that it was just FUN, and those mid 90's Stratos hulls are exactly that, flat out good and fun!

[ethand]

had time this weekend to run this boat some.i have the prop to pad at 3.75".raker 2 prop 24",chinewalk is not near as bad.livewell was half full with half tank of fuel.speed was 55 mph gps.trimmed out properly I could only get about 5000 rpm.i should be able to get 5500 to 5800 rpm out of the etec 150ho.also I could not leave the engine at full trim because the boat would start to hop(bunny hop)I would have to hit the trim switch down and then the boat would smooth out.what suggestions can I try to get rid of the bunny hop and get the top rpm out of this boat.thanks guys very much

[tdt91]

JR19 knows this boat well and I have the big brother to it with a 200HO. I learned early on that a full live well and full fuel helped a bunch with chime walk. After many years of dealing with it I tried a prop with bigger ears and it helped a bunch. Then I got the Etec and started running a 25 Tempest and that helped too but I can still get to some chime if I'm not loaded back heavy. Then I tried the 25 Trophy and I've found a great all around prop, the larger dia on the props seems to help these rigs as do being azz heavy. Good luck with it.

[JR19]

I would raise it to 3.25"...but I don't think this will gain you all that you need to gain.

Something is wrong other than your set up but I only have a guess as to what it is. Your motor has a throttle position sensor. If you have the diagnostic hardware you can verify that your getting 100% full throttle. The throttle linkage has a set number it needs to be in. If my memory is correct too much travel will set off an alarm. I "think" too little travel is just a loss of throttle/rpm. This is really something a certified tech needs to check/adjust.

[ethand]

thanks guys very much.next time out I will raise engine to 3.25 and take it from there.thanks again