Just Added Lifting Strakes

[davalt75]

I know there are several posts on this forum about strakes but I didn't see anything recently and I wanted to share my experience in case anyone is considering adding strakes to their boat. My boat is a 2021 Starcraft EX22FD. It is 22 ft. with the 3/4 center "sport" toon. The toons are 25" and the boat has a Yamaha 150 with a stainless 17 pitch prop.
The boat rode great before and had decent speed. I could achieve 32-33 mph at WOT under ideal conditions. Nothing to sneeze at, but I primarily cruise on Lake Marion in SC. It is over 700 sq. miles and riding 20-30 miles at a clip is not uncommon. I wanted to be able to cruise a little faster without running full throttle, as well as hopefully see an improvement in fuel economy by getting the boat up on top of the water more. Now, usually someone will inevitably point out that a pontoon boat isn't made for speed, and I would tend to agree with that. But they are definitely building them to go faster these days than they used to. Adding strakes won't make sense for everyone in every situation. Not every boat is created equal and what everyone wants or needs out of their boat is not the same. I like the room and comfort that a pontoon offers but I still want to be able to get from A to B at more than a leisurely cruising speed if needed. Anybody who has ever been out on a large lake miles from the hill when a summer thunderstorm pops up knows what I mean.
That being said, I put a lot of thought into things like: most likely voiding the manufacturer's warranty on the toons, finding the right person to do the job, and whether the cost was worth the reward. After a lot of research online in this forum and others, I decided to pull the trigger. I'll give a shout out to American Equipment Co. in Lexington, SC. The owners of this business are the family that originally owned Bentley Pontoon for years. They recently sold that business and started American Equipment, which primarily does boat restorations. I felt good about having them do the job because of their years of experience in the boat building business. After telling them what I wanted, they recommended adding the strakes to the inside and outside of the outer toons and leaving the center toon as is. This is different advice from what I was expecting given what I have read online from other people. But I decided to trust their experience and that is how the boat is set up.
I picked the boat up yesterday and briefly tried it out on the way home with it. I didn't have much time so I can't speak on any potential fuel savings yet. I'll update that later. I just drove it a couple of miles and got it up to WOT a couple of times. From what I have read online, I was hoping to see an increase of 5-8 mph. I got 10! 42.5 mph is where she topped out at on GPS. I'm attaching a picture for proof. As far as I'm concerned, that is hauling the mail for a pontoon boat. The only negative thing I can mention so far is that it rides a little rougher than it did before. It kind of feels like it is skipping over the top of the water, like if you were to skip a rock. It doesn't ride bad, but I can definitely notice a difference. It was buttery smooth before, but it was plowing through the water instead of riding on top of it. I'm thinking of adding under skinning next. I've read that will help with ride comfort as well as fuel economy by eliminating the drag from the water hitting the cross members under the boat. I would love to hear any input from anyone who has under skinned their boat and what the results were.

[playcat]

Looks like you accomplished your goal. That is a pretty good speed for a 150hp toon. How about some details?
How long a process was it to go from contacting the folks doing the work until the boat was ready?
How much $$$?
Besides the change in ride quality, any other changes? How about turning, getting on/off the trailer, anything else?
Underskinning may not add much speed. but it will quiet the ride by reducing the water hitting the underside crossmembers. The underskinning on my old Playcraft toon helped a lot until it partially peeled off one day backing out of the slip! My lifting-type trailer was a big help in fixing it. Lots of new rivets and screws!
Thanks for posting!

[davalt75]

It was approximately a week after I first contacted them before I was able to take the boat and drop it off. They are about an hour and a half drive from my house. From the time I dropped it off until the called me and said it was ready was 2 and a half weeks. When I picked it up they told me it would have been ready sooner but it ended up being more work than anticipated. Apparently on the ones they have done in the past, the toons were off of the boat, which made them a lot easier to work on. On mine they did all of the work with the boat on the trailer, which made it more difficult. So it ended up taking about 14 hours of work total. Their welder splits time between working for them and somewhere else, so that slowed things down. In fact, they told me they under bid the job. They charged $2,000 total, but said in the future if anyone asks it will be $1,500 per toon instead of $1,000. I haven' driven it enough to be able to tell how much turning is affected but I will update in the weeks ahead. Usually when cruising at 30 plus mph, I wouldn't be making any sharp turns, though. It is a little trickier loading it on the trailer because the strakes make the bottom of the toons basically flat, and it's harder to center the toons in the V of the bunk boards. The strakes aren't made for bearing the weight of the boat and it is kind of hard to line it up perfectly to where at least one of the strakes isn't resting on a bunk board instead of on either side of the bunk boards.

[Marc K]

Gaining 10 mph is pretty darned incredible! I appreciate you making the effort to report back - more data points are always a good thing.

Marc

[davalt75]

I was pleasantly surprised to say the least. I was expecting 5-6 mph and hoping for 8. The speed reading was from my Simrad gps fish finder. I know it is accurate, but I wish I had thought to verify it using the speedometer app on my phone, just to leave no room for doubt. I'll do that next time I take it out.

[davalt75]

Just updating the post. Took the boat out today and replicated the results from before. With just me and the wife in the boat and the top down, we ran 43 mph on the nose, clocked by the gps on the depth finder and verified with the speedometer app on my phone. I can cruise 30 mph at 4600 rpms and 25 mph at 4000. We rode a total of 43 miles at an average speed of 28-30 mph and only used a half tank of gas. That's a big improvement from before the strakes.

[curtiscapk]

Freakin sweet!

[Steiner]

Hey, I noticed you have a Simrad but in your other thread you said you didn't know your fuel mileage. I installed a network kit and the Simrad fuel data manager on mine. It picks up the injector rate from your outboard and gives you fuel mpg and you can also set your tank size and it'll give you a virtual fuel tank that you just "set to full" every time you fill up or input how many gallons you added if not filling up. It's accurate within a gallon or so, as long as the Simrad is on every time the engine is running. Having the fuel data manager also lets you track fuel mileage/usage for trips and things like that. I have my Simrad wired to turn on every time the master power switch on the dash is turned on.

This is the kit needed to network your Simrad and outboard if they're not already networked. I think you need one more T to connect the fuel data manager and there is a Yamaha pigtail you can use just to get the square data connector to put on the end of the long NMEA cable and not have to cut or splice into the wires on the outboard's data connector

Fuel data manager
https://www.westmarine.com/simrad-fuel- ... 47082.html
NMEA starter kit
https://www.amazon.com/Garmin-010-11442 ... 0030EMZYW/
Extra T
https://www.amazon.com/Micro-C-T-Connec ... 086N5H6NH/

If not already networked:
Cut the round connector off the end of the long NMEA cable in the starter kit, feed through the cable bulkhead at the outboard, then cut the connector off this cable and splice it onto the NMEA cable. It plugs into the Yamaha data plug.
https://www.amazon.com/6Y8-82521-01-Pig ... 0C3SL2B4Q/

[riplipper]

That is very impressive improvement. I have strakes on inner side and center tube but cannot help but think outer strakes would help a lot.
Now you got me thinking. $$$$$$

[davalt75]

Hey, I noticed you have a Simrad but in your other thread you said you didn't know your fuel mileage. I installed a network kit and the Simrad fuel data manager on mine. It picks up the injector rate from your outboard and gives you fuel mpg and you can also set your tank size and it'll give you a virtual fuel tank that you just "set to full" every time you fill up or input how many gallons you added if not filling up. It's accurate within a gallon or so, as long as the Simrad is on every time the engine is running. Having the fuel data manager also lets you track fuel mileage/usage for trips and things like that. I have my Simrad wired to turn on every time the master power switch on the dash is turned on.

This is the kit needed to network your Simrad and outboard if they're not already networked. I think you need one more T to connect the fuel data manager and there is a Yamaha pigtail you can use just to get the square data connector to put on the end of the long NMEA cable and not have to cut or splice into the wires on the outboard's data connector

Fuel data manager
https://www.westmarine.com/simrad-fuel- ... 47082.html
NMEA starter kit
https://www.amazon.com/Garmin-010-11442 ... 0030EMZYW/
Extra T
https://www.amazon.com/Micro-C-T-Connec ... 086N5H6NH/

If not already networked:
Cut the round connector off the end of the long NMEA cable in the starter kit, feed through the cable bulkhead at the outboard, then cut the connector off this cable and splice it onto the NMEA cable. It plugs into the Yamaha data plug.
https://www.amazon.com/6Y8-82521-01-Pig ... 0C3SL2B4Q/

Thanks for the recommendation. I knew the Simrad had the ability to do that. I just didn't know how difficult it would be to add the necessary components for it to work. I'm at work now but I will check out the links you provided when I get home.

[davalt75]

That is very impressive improvement. I have strakes on inner side and center tube but cannot help but think outer strakes would help a lot.
Now you got me thinking. $$$$$$

As I mentioned, both sides of the outer toons is what the installer recommended. But I will say that even though I've seen a substantial increase in speed and fuel economy, as some have mentioned in other posts, it is harder to turn at high speed with the strakes on the outside of the toons. I didn't mention before but the strakes are 6". Some boats have 4" strakes, I believe.

[Steiner]

Regarding the strakes, I do not think they will put them on "express tubes" or 3/4 tubes because they're not full length so they wouldn't do much. Other than that with a full length full center toon, I think center strakes help them steer better? My boat is also a 3/4 center with factory strakes only on both sides of the outer tubes. The fuel and transom pod is toon shaped and the same width as the other U shaped toons but is not as tall so from the rear you can see the center toon hanging down a couple inches lower.

Regarding the Simrad, it's really easy to hook up. The worst part is running the cable to the outboard but even that is not so bad if your deck side plate comes off easily....actually if yours doesn't have underskinning you don't even have to worry with that so even running the cable is easy. Just have to remove the rubber from one of the available holes in the outboard bulkhead and then put a little grease on the cable before shoving it through (with barrel connector cut off). Every thing else just mounts wherever you can find room under the helm and it's just the one power connection. My boat is a lower end Suncatcher and all of the ones on the dealer lot had Simrads in them. The higher end ones had the bigger screens and no physical gauges, and they were networked at the factory so the Simrad gauge pack/screen was used. On the ones like mine with physical gauges they did not connect the Simrad to the outboard. One of the main reasons I did it is that the tach did not have an hour meter. I asked the dealer about it and he said they didn't come with hour meter tachs and I was like so how do you know when to service it? You gotta take it to the dealer to let them hook up to the outboard? No thanks. Engine hours now display on the Simrad with it networked.

If you have to push a button to turn your Simrad on, you can also easily wire it to turn on automatically. If this is the case, there is a yellow wire hanging loose from the Simrad power cable which I think they call the "auto on" control. This can be connected to another 12V source so that when it receives 12V, the Simrad automatically turns on. Since my unit only has 12V on the main red wire when the master switch on the dash is turned on, I just connected the red and yellow wires together so when the dash switch is on the Simrad turns on. It can still be put to sleep or turned off as normal.

[riplipper]

That is very impressive improvement. I have strakes on inner side and center tube but cannot help but think outer strakes would help a lot.
Now you got me thinking. $$$$$$

As I mentioned, both sides of the outer toons is what the installer recommended. But I will say that even though I've seen a substantial increase in speed and fuel economy, as some have mentioned in other posts, it is harder to turn at high speed with the strakes on the outside of the toons. I didn't mention before but the strakes are 6". Some boats have 4" strakes, I believe.

Six inch?? Wow, that is definitely a lot of lift.
I wasn't sure if it would hurt of help turning. My thought was they would help at higher speed due to lifting the toon out of the water making it turn easier. Guess that is not the case.

[Rick McC.]

My Qwest tritoon has strakes on both sides of all three toons; and turns great. It rides very well, too.
I run it mostly out in the Gulf.

[davalt75]

My Qwest tritoon has strakes on both sides of all three toons; and turns great. It rides very well, too.
I run it mostly out in the Gulf.

When I was doing research trying to decide whether or not to add the strakes, I read a few people mention that the outer strakes would dig in when trying to turn and make turning more difficult. The "digging in" part didn't make sense to me since the boat is riding on top of the water rather than plowing through it. As I mentioned, though, I did notice the boat wanted to continue going straight when I turned the wheel at high speed. I'm glad to hear that isn't the case with yours. I didn't notice it when I slowed down some. I need to do a trial next time I take it out and see exactly at what speed the turning is affected. But I won't be running wide open very often, and certainly won't be trying to make any sharp turns at over 40 mph. So I don't really see it being an issue for me.