The engine popped up on craigslist a couple of months back. Here local in Maryland a yamaha dealer had 3 of them. I'm not sure why they were never sold, but the dealer put them for sale and i got the last of the 3. New in crate, never run............it's a really sweet engine for sure. Yamaha would even honor a 2 year warranty if i wanted to pay to have a dealer install it. I chose to install myself as i hope to not have any major issues with it inside 2 years.
The safe operating range for the engine is 5500 RPM.
Right now my anti-cavitation plate is slightly above the keel but not a full inch. I only have 1 more hole to go up.
The prop is a Mercury Black Diamond 13.25 x 17p aluminum prop.
The boat comes right out of the hole with very little bow rise. I can stay on plane down to about 3500 RPM's and probably 13 - 14 mph.
I'm very satisfied with the cruise speed. I was expecting a little more top end but thats not terribly important. I fish the chesapeake bay waters mostly. 95% of the time an alum prop is fine. Where the stainless comes in handy is when i fish skinny water around the barrier islands where you are running in sand. The sand will file down an aluminum prop in no time at all.
Let me ask this...............if i had the exact same prop as i do now, just in stainless steel.....how would it affect the performance? Would i typically more or less RPM's, what would it change?
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