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[Will hedrick]

[Will hedrick]

Pics of my boat

[Will hedrick]

[Will hedrick]

Bob done an absolutely amazing job on my lower

[Gordon02]

Will, Hi and Welcome to the site!

I have a XB2002 with a Mercury ProMax SS sitting back 13.5" off the transom, but feel even it's too heavy at rest. When I fish with a partner, full tank of gas, just two batteries, and half a livewell, the rub rails at the rear of the sponsons are at the waterline. I bought my boat brand new and it's one of the full composite models, but it's always been that way. My first motor was a 1986 GT150 on a 10" jack and it was worse.

I do like my boat, but it's deep-V and narrow 83" beam mine does not carry the weight like I'd want. I gotta say though, your's looks awesome with the Blue on Blue. I love those Stripes too! Too bad Evinrude does not offer 15" mid-sections. The change from a 20" motor to this 15" ProMax did wonders for the steering and balance, not to mention the 96.2 GPS that came with it.

Again, Welcome! Gordon

[Will hedrick]

Hey Gordon thanks for the info. I'm running 3 24 class batteries (all in the back behind livewell) and 80 lb. Trolling motor with 2 200 lb guys gear loaded with the 28 4 blade I am turning 6400 rpm with a pretty insane holeshot when it falls over with all the torque that thing produces, 15" mid would greatly help as well as seeing if I could curve that 250 to 300 specs, I would love to see what changes that would bring out of it

[Gordon02]

I'm guessing that your rub rail is below the waterline at rest with the additional 200 or more lbs sitting at the rear. A deep cycle battery will add about 70 lbs and I'm guessing the big HO is 100~150 lbs over the 375 lbs ProMax. The lake I fish is big water and that can get rough with a thunderstorm. A dead engine could mean water over the transom and easy swamping/trouble - something I think about the older I get. I understand why Darris had those grave concerns. Be careful!

This is an old, crappy photo before and after I made the ProMax swap - This 26" Trophy is my fishing prop and delivers 2 people 86 mph with an impressive hole-shot. My 30" Chopper stays on the wall. I don't need to go that fast anymore and don't like the wear/tear on the gearcase when using it. The photo shows why the 15" fits these small boats better than the 20". My steering on the 20" was binding and the old Johnson did not have the beans to go past 78 mph. Darris was warning everyone back then not to use any of the available hydraulic steering system, so the opposing cables are all the XB2002 could run. I added reeds, LWP, Land & Sea mounts, and a 29" SRX....none of that delivered anywhere near the speed that Bass & Walleye Boats magazine had reported during their record runs. A change to a black motor worked magic...

Gordon

[Will hedrick]

My rails are close do not sit in the water. at least 3 inches out of the water loaded, now i'f both guys get on the back deck it will set the transom down, ( don't do that anymore after I triedto met a 5 lb.r for my partner) lol. I would love to know if I can raise the limiter safely, and what might have to be done to do so?

[dgscroggs]

There are options out there, u can get the midsection cut and shortened to 16” , there’s a couple of people that do great job on them , that’s my next modification and u can also do a sportmaster conversion for better gear ratio and reliability

[David]

How high can you run your gearcase? I would expect that to limit the Etec speed.

[xb03fs]

Setup is where you need to work. 250 hp is enough to run a lot faster than you are.

finding the right balance left to right is number 1. Finding the correct motor height is number 2. When your ready to really tweak front to back balance....

a 250 mercury pushes my much heavier xb21 into the 90s. A 2.5 200 pushed my previous heavier xb2003 to 90.

You have enough hp to go as fast as you want.. likely the low gear ration in the etec will be the limitation

[Will hedrick]

How high can you run your gearcase? I would expect that to limit the Etec speed.

I'm not sure on how many rpms the gearcase can turn,
I have thought about a15" mid, but don't know a good shop to do so, or roughly the cost. I know it is fat shaft lower. It is a 2012 motor, I was told it was one ofthe better years. I have no prob turning a 28 or 30 to the rev. Limiter though

[xb03fs]

What is gear ratio of gearcase and rev limiter of etec?

[dgscroggs]

I'm not sure on how many rpms the gearcase can turn,
I have thought about a15" mid, but don't know a good shop to do so, or roughly the cost. I know it is fat shaft lower. It is a 2012 motor, I was told it was one ofthe better years. I have no prob turning a 28 or 30 to the rev. Limiter though

closest place to cut mid from Tennessee that I know is Calhoun marine in South Carolina, Michael Chapman haven’t seen on here in a while but he does great work u can see some of his work in the archives on this site

[BOATMANBLUES]

I have no prob turning a 28 or 30 to the rev. Limiter though[/QUOTE]

That will be the rub with your combo for big top end numbers....the better you get your setup , the more this comes into play...in the old days you just stuck some packs with no rev limiters on there and twisted it on up...the HO i think has a 6250 limiter...the L2 gearcase ,if its still on there ,has a 1.71 :1 ratio....if its been replaced with an M2 ,that has a 1.85:1 ratio ...the magnums big barrel and ratio slowed things down considerably....the L2 still couldn't be run as high as needed on that boat, with out low water pickups...
However we rigged a few with this combo for customers and if they didn't care about that top end speed number to brag about ,they really liked it...just prop it where it gets up and rolls easily and have fun....