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Help with a '85 Checkmate Predictor stability

I

ibigi

New member
Hi all,
I am ibigi from Hungary. I have a ’85 Checkmate Predictor fitted with a 150 HP 4 stroke Honda outboard. My problem is that near to its maximal speed, around 55 mph, the boat starts to behave very nervously. It feels as if it was rolling from side to side. Just to get the feeling of it, if it was a car, I would say it loses its directional stability. And the problem seems to be somehow related to load (no. of persons aboard). It occurs at a much lower speed with 1-2 persons, and sometimes does not occur at all with 5 people. If this happens, the only way to calm the boat is to dramatically decrease the speed.
Has anyone had a similar problem? What can be the cause?
The trim plate of the motor is about 1 ¼ inch higher than the bottom of the boat, which I was told is not ideal. May this cause the rolling? Can the installation of a jack (lift) plate help?
BTW I see a lot of Checkmates fitted with jacks. What is the reason for that?

Any ideas/info would be highly appreciated.
 
For your first question, what you're experiencing is called chine walking. All V-bottom boats will do that when reaching high speeds with a light load. You have to work on your setup, and learn how to drive to counter-act the chine-walking. There's great info here about chine-walking, you can do a search to find answers.

The reason jack plates are installed on the back of boats is to allow vertical engine adjustment, and to help balance the boat. Your Honda is very heavy, I don't think a jack plate would help your setup much. If your cavitation plate is about 1 1/4" above the bottom of the boat, you may be quite close to ideal engine height also. You can try raising and lowering the motor on the mount holes to see what happens.
 
Thank you guys for the info. Now I have the keyword (chine walk) so I will make some more research in the forum.
 
Welcome aboard. My girlfriend is also Hungarian, she and her family are from a small town just an hour oustide of Budapest. I just wanted to welcome you to the site. Sorry, I'm not sure what your problem is, but good luck with that, and I hope you get it figured out.

Once again welcome!
 
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