engine hieght and prop contribute to chine walking and can be the actual cause not so much hull design prop torque wants to turn boat to right you instincly correct pulling it left this creates a slight wobble motion wetted surfaces shifting left to right can get out of control real quick lower unit shape also factors in lowering engine center of gravity helps alot old time old school racer ART
This is an excellent thread. I just bought a z118 with a 150, so I likely won't experience chine walk, but I have a solid understanding now if I do experience it. I used to ride sport bikes so the lot of the physics going on there translates well for me. You don't want to break (back off) or accelerate in a skid because you can give up what grip you do have. You have a dollar to spend. You can spend 50 cents on cornering and 50 cents on acceleration, or any combination as long as you don't spend more than a dollar. When you spend more than a dollar you crash. You have to steer out of it and maintain your throttle. Excellent post!
So I saw this video and a few others prior to running my z8-250 hard. But I struggled to fix the chine walk for a couple months till--- I was quickly coming off plane in a narrow spot and didn't want to scare another boater, I twitched steering left and right out of boredom, what I noticed was the exhaust got louder left and quieter right, ( the turning prop vs direction of the correctional twitch) simply by twitching right vs left I could control the boat 85-90 times better. So try that as well when learning. Twitch rite
Link on first page is broken (Photobucket policy change victim). Can be found on Youtube, though, as of this post. Just search on "chine walk bass boat".
My 201PE just chine walked on me for the first time yesterday after finally getting a better prop on it. Increased my top end from 60-62 to 68 (as fast as I drove it yesterday), and right at 68 it started chine walking. At first I didn't even realize what it was, it was so gentle. Felt like maybe I was running across some small wakes from other boats. I shut it down able 5-10 seconds later to enter a no wake zone, and only once I was puttering along and thinking about it did I realize what had happened. That article was a good read, as I think I was possibly running too much trim and not enough throttle.
Ill work on it more next time I'm out.
So I'm about 2 years late on this thread but I was wondering if you make the steering correction while "walking" will it stop the walking and you can drive through it or is the walking continuous and you just have to manage it through upper speeds? Thanks.
I am late also. I just bought a 2019 Nitro Z19 with a 200 hp mercury pro xs and i have only been able to get 66. something because of walking. I am trying to drive through it but run out of water. I am working on it and have not figured it out yet. I am told that you can correct it with steering each time it does it. I had a 1997 Procraft 180 bass and only had it walk a couple times but not as bad as i have now. At times it can be scary to be honest. Still learning this boat it is a way different animal than my Procraft this thing will move.
Most boats with a pad will chine walk if you get them going fast enough. My advice if your new to it, don't let it keep doing it, it will get worse. When it is chine walking don't EVER just back completely out of it, that will never end good. It does take practice to prevent. You have to get to where you can feel the boat, when it is about to start, and then correct it. once it goes back and forth and you dont correct , it will get scary and hairy quick. Some people say you learn to drive thru it, I say you "drive it out of it". It is like counter steering a car when the rear end breaks loose.
My 2 cents worth.
It ain’t rocket science, if I can do it, anybody can. Chine walking is kind of always there once the boat gets up on pad and the front end starts floating out there. The thing no one ever explained to me and there’s absolutely zero videos that reference this is.... When you bump the wheel to correct the walking, it takes about a Half a second before the boat will react...SO, when it pushes left, you turn left, give it a half second to respond then it will push right, you push right, give it a half second to respond and the process keeps going for as long as you are near top speed. At this point it will become a rhythm that you will cycle with the boat as it’s pushing back and forth. Sometimes around 69 or 70 my boat will quit it and will drive straight and true but occasionally I feel it start to move and I will correct it. It is always there and you maintain it, it never really goes away. Most people, myself included, as soon as the boat starts to move they expect it to be an immediate fix when you bump the wheel, it’s not immediate. You have to trust for a half a second that the boat is going to react to your input without you freezing up or letting out of the throttle. Hold it, bump it, trust it.
Learn to drive it and feel what it’s doing and it becomes second nature. There is no magic setup or magic measurement, these are all just starting points. If you wanna go fast, you have to be able to control the boat. It is no different than hitting a wake at 70 miles per hour from a 45 degree side angle, you don’t just sit back and plow into them, you hit them and jerk the wheel back and forth to keep the boat from digging in, chine walk is a very similar principle, you have to drive the freakin boat.
You can run the jack plate up to about 2 1/2 or 2 5/8 inches below pad and it will almost minimize the walk to nothing, however, your speed will suffer. This is what I did first and realized I was headed in the wrong direction. As I’ve seen posted in all kinds of posts on here, seat time is the best time.... good luck.
My boat is a 2018 Triton 21 TRx Elite with a 2018 Optimax 250 ProXS, running a 24 Fury with no holes plugged, Atlas hydraulic Jack Plate, 2 - 8 foot poles. 12” HDS live on console and bow, 9” Panoptix on bow, Ultrex, Ionic Lithium’s for cranking and trolling, tournament rigged and ready it will run 69-72 all day.
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This is an old video with Smallmouth Guy, we lost him on Feb 15, 2020 to pancreatic cancer... love to come on an read and see his posts... sadly I wasn't in a position to buy his Triton.. I miss this guy and that beautiful Triton and the times we had on Kentucky Lake... rest easy Bub, see you soon!
My buddy has a Baja with a bad Chine walk, it got fixed with a divorce.(had to sell boat)
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Here is a great video that explains all the dynamics of chine walk done by Rick Pierce president of Basscat Boats.
Going straight…have a very slight turn to the left. That will keep you out of it and give you more confidence in other conditions. Or trim down a bit while still practicing and find the sweet spot you are comfortable with.