Which designs for water-skiing?

[TKa]

Hello all. I am new to the forum and I would like to thank you very much for accepting me. I am afraid English is not my first (or second) language. So please forgive me if I make mistakes.

I am looking for a small open boat design which will be mainly used for;
- Amateur water-skiing on sea (sometimes little choppy),
- Carrying up to 4 people (including helmsman) in short distances.

Please keep in mind, speed of the boat should be between 20 to 30 mph while water-skiing. Boat should be able to carry/handle adequate outboard and speed. I hope you don't laugh at me at my first post but I am thinking of GV13 (maybe little on steroids). ))
Also, boat should be as small as possible and as easy to build as possible. Cabin is not needed.
I will be glad if the designer and experiences builders give their opinions.

[BarraMan]

A GV13 would be a very poor ski boat unless you just want to teach kids to ski ! 25hp won’t pull an adult out of the water.
In my opinion, 100hp is probably the minimum for a useful ski boat.

[fallguy1000]

You need steering for any boat to ski behind. Now, I've pulled tubes and such behind my 16' tiller boat and wakeboarders, but the weight of the people makes it impossible for the boat and skier to get up on plane with the hole shot due to all the stern weight and skier, etc.

You'll need enough power to lift the boat, passengers, and dragging skier. About 70hp...and console steering. As Barraman said, about 100hp is the real low end for skiing. I think you can sneak in with70, or 90, though. You might need to prop down for better hole shot which would be a loss of top end..if the motor is a bit small.

Boats in the length range you cited are not going to meet the power or size requirementsfor passengers.

A few of the others might offer you better options, but a 17' boat would be the goal, in my opinion. The FS17 is a great boat plan with many built.

[Reid]

TKa,

I agree with the other replies thus far. Unless you are pulling kids under 12 years of age, you need to have a boat that has enough HP to get the hull on plane and pull a skier out of the water. Too little HP will put tremendous strain on the motor and will not give you the performance you need for watersports. I would look for a design that has a HP recommendation of at least 90Hp and is set up for a console with remote steering (not tiller). I would lean towards the FS19 or C19.
-Reid

[pee wee]

I agree, for water skiing a 17' boat would be better than a 13'. The OB17 would be another good candidate:

[TomW1]

Welcome to the forum TKa. You are not going to get any support for the GV13 as it just to small for what you want to do. The smallest boat I can think of that will meet your requirements is the OB15 with the 50HP motor on it. The plans have a version with a center console which is what you need.

Good luck

Tom

[TKa]

A GV13 would be a very poor ski boat unless you just want to teach kids to ski ! 25hp won’t pull an adult out of the water.
In my opinion, 100hp is probably the minimum for a useful ski boat.

Are you sure about 100 HP? It seems too much for amateur water-skiing. It mostly happens around 20-25 mph.
Tom advised OB15 with the 50HP motor on it. I will be glad if you comment on this.

///

You need steering for any boat to ski behind. Now, I've pulled tubes and such behind my 16' tiller boat and wake boarders, but the weight of the people makes it impossible for the boat and skier to get up on plane with the hole shot due to all the stern weight and skier, etc.

You'll need enough power to lift the boat, passengers, and dragging skier. About 70hp...and console steering. As Barraman said, about 100hp is the real low end for skiing. I think you can sneak in with70, or 90, though. You might need to prop down for better hole shot which would be a loss of top end..if the motor is a bit small.

Boats in the length range you cited are not going to meet the power or size requirements for passengers.

A few of the others might offer you better options, but a 17' boat would be the goal, in my opinion. The FS17 is a great boat plan with many built.

Very good comments, thank you. What do you think of OB15 with the 50HP on it (as Tom mentioned above)?

///

TKa,

I agree with the other replies thus far. Unless you are pulling kids under 12 years of age, you need to have a boat that has enough HP to get the hull on plane and pull a skier out of the water. Too little HP will put tremendous strain on the motor and will not give you the performance you need for watersports. I would look for a design that has a HP recommendation of at least 90Hp and is set up for a console with remote steering (not tiller). I would lean towards the FS19 or C19.
-Reid

Hi Reid. Thank you very much for your comment. What do you think of OB15 with 50 HP on it? Please keep in mind that it is amateur water-skiing done around 20-25 mph, not pro slalom.

///

I agree, for water skiing a 17' boat would be better than a 13'. The OB17 would be another good candidate:

Beautiful boat! Is it yours?
What do you think of OB15 + 50 HP?

///

Welcome to the forum TKa. You are not going to get any support for the GV13 as it just to small for what you want to do. The smallest boat I can think of that will meet your requirements is the OB15 with the 50HP motor on it. The plans have a version with a center console which is what you need.

Good luck

Tom

Hi Tom, Thank you for your comment. OB15 is really interesting advice. I knew this boat but didn't consider because of its low freeboard and flat/lake type design. But you are right, it can handle speed and choppy seas.
Look what I found while searching :
viewtopic.php?p=257712&hilit=OB15+speed#p257712

AdamG (OB15 builder/owner) mentions that he gets 36 mph with 60 HP and the boat is finely controllable.
Interesting.

[BarraMan]

A GV13 would be a very poor ski boat unless you just want to teach kids to ski ! 25hp won’t pull an adult out of the water.
In my opinion, 100hp is probably the minimum for a useful ski boat.

Are you sure about 100 HP? It seems too much for amateur water-skiing. It mostly happens around 20-25 mph.
Tom advised OB15 with the 50HP motor on it. I will be glad if you comment on this.

I generally try to NOT comment on things I don't know much about!

I do know a bit about water skiing and ski boats, having skied for almost 60 yrs , taught my wife and kids to ski and taught more other people to ski than I can remember. My wife and I were pretty hard core when we first were married and skied several time a week. Easy because the dam was only a 15 minute drive away. One drove the boat while the other skied! We often used our labrador dog as an observer if nobody else was available. She would bark if the skier fell off!

The first boat I skied behind was a 15' runabout with a 65 hp Johnson on the back. Adequate, but only just!

You are right that skiing is mostly done around 20-25 mph/kts. My sons (adults) ski on single skis at 25-28 kts. The issue with a ski boat is the ability to pull the skier up out of the water quickly, rather than its speed once on the plane. This is the reason that inboards are often favoured as ski boats (lots of torque to put them on the plane quickly) - but I am an O/B guy!

I have owned a 16' runabout with a 150 Merc on the back and a 16' runabout with a 175 Mariner and a 17' boat with 175 hp



- plus my current boat (22' with a 250 Yamaha Vmax SHO). I have skied behind my 14' tiller-steer tinnie with 40 hp , a 15' boats with 100 and 175 hp, a 16’ boat with 175 hp and a 17' boat with 225 hp - plus a range of inboards.

If I fill the bait well at the back of my boat, it does a pretty good impression of a wake board boat too!

So! Based on my experience, if you want a boat that will adequately ski an adult on a single ski or a couple of kids on doubles, and be useful for teaching beginners to ski, I will stick to my 100 hp 4-stroke minimum on a 15-16' boat.

[fallguy1000]

I am going to have to disagree with Tom a bit.

I have a 50hp motor on a 16' aluminum skiff. If we have four people, we cannot pull up amateurs. Now, my boat has a prop for speed, not hole shot. And not console steering.

What would happen if you start off with a 50hp motor is in about the 4th outing; or first; you will feel underpowered. Amateur skiers need to be impacted by the boat very little. If the boat struggles to pop out of the hole; the amateur skier will really have a hard time getting going. The boat slows in the hole and the skier falls over; worse with more passengers on.

The 70hp Yamaha s the lightest in class last time I checked and would be about the drop dead minimum I would try to start out as a ski boat.

Where things fail is with a boatful of people out having a fun day. You really want the extra power. Lee or Barraman is really not wrong. You can prop down the 70 or a 90hp outboard to pop out of the hole and sacrifice a little top end and still ski, but his 100hp estimate is pretty accurate.

Just because someone can ski behind a 50hp motor doesn't mean newbies will.

[fallguy1000]

Another thing we have done is started to use our jetski for the pulling vessel. Then we can have 6 people and a cooler full of drinks on my boat and pull a tube behind the skiff.

But you have to be super careful about keeping the rope away from the intake. We screwed up once. Well, my kid did....I towed him in.