Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

First post.

Picking up my first Pontoon on Thursday. It's a 2012 Harris 250SL Tri-toon with lifting stakes and Mercury Verado 150 on the back. I test drove this weekend on the river and the current owner mentioned a top speed of around 30 mph and that was all I could get out of her. I drove another 24' foot dual toon with the same engine that got 30 and understanding is that with the 3rd toon and the lifting stakes this boat should be a little faster than 30.

I looked at the motor and it's mounted on the 2nd from the bottom hole with a 14 prop (seems high to me but need to check when running). WOT was around 6k on the rpm so I don't think it's a prop issue. I was able to trim up without issue and we only had 3 people on board, bimini down, and 1/2 tank of gas.

If 30 is all I get I am fine with that, just other similar sized boats with that motor reported closer to 36/37. Maybe that is all this boat will do, just looking for advice on where to start looking once I get the boat back on the water.

My second question (coming from drive on v-hull trailers) is the boat seems finiky to get back on the trailer straight. It's a float on trailer from Hoosier. Even with about 6-8 feet of the boards out the water, it takes multiple attempts to get the back end over the boards correctly. My V-Hulls just took a gentle nudge and sat down fine on the boards, any advice on trailer positioning or external guides is appreciated so I don't speed extra time at the ramp.

Hi Chris, Welcome to the forum. I don’t think I have any advice for you, but I will give my experience on my new similar boat, but 22.5 feet. My info is in the signature. I get about 36 or 37 mph top speed at around 5,800 rpm. As far as loading the boat onto the trailer, the few times we’ve done it it’s been easy with no repositioning needed. I’m sure our trailer may be different than yours though. It’s a Bear trailer with bunks.

Edit: corrected RPM number.

1) If your trailer has the short inside "guide posts"" on it---position them as far to the back of the trailer as they will go--I did mine and it made all the difference. I also put a piece of tape on the fence to use as an aiming sight to make sure you are positioned over the bunks when driving on.
2) Make sure cavitation plate is even with bottom of motor mounting pod.
3) RPMs seem a little high for that motor--maybe increase pitch to 15-should get rpms down to 5800 maybe. Solas prop website gives rpms for different brand motors.. I'm not sure what yours should be but if gauge is correct--I think 6K is a little high.
4) Not sure about about a 25 ft boat but you may have so much weight in front that it is hard to trim it out enough to get up on the strakes.

Good luck....and welcome to the forum!

btw---rpm range according to Solas for the motor is 5800-6400--so looks like you are in range.

thanks for the advice, will be on the water on Sunday so I will check a few things and report back. It was hard to push it doing a test ride.

Wanted to tie this off for anyone that found it in the future.

Flast lake, 4 people with coolers, WOT got to around 34 MPH with good tilt. I am at the low-end power on this boat (300hp max) but she did well. Crusie was around 25 @ 5000 rpm and 15-18 @ 4000.

The trailer was still an issue but the ramp was busy so I only had one shot and was probably too low in the water.

Thanks for the advise.