question: short shaft kicker with long shaft main motor

[dremarquis]

Hi everyone,

i recently bought a used Crestliner with a long shaft 90hp evinrude. Although advice had been a little mixed, the consensus seemed to be that the kicker should also be long shaft. A guy near Oswego advertised this 15hp Yamaha as a 20" shaft. I drove over 2hrs to get there. The motor is clean and ran well and i was not sure it was a short shaft, but suspected it was. It is a short shaft.

However, given that i am only going to use it for trolling, do you think this is acceptable or quite suboptimal? (please see photos)

thanks for your input,

andre

[rolmops]

That setup is fine,remember you are not trying to break any speed records so there is little need for precision. You will definitely not have any cavitation problems with that kicker.

[ray koziatek]

ive trolled with a short shaft for years,, the only problem is when it gets a little bumpy (wa ves) it will give ya some out of the water over revs,( cavatation),ya just gotta be a little fussy when ya can use it... depending on your boats handling will determine how big of water you can tolerate...(troller)

[MCF]

I have used a short shaft on several boats, including a starcraft with a similar set up to your Crestliner. You are not using the kicker to put the boat on plane, so shaft size is irrelevant. I concur with Ray above on wavy days it will the prop will come out of the water. Your short shaft will always hold its value and use it while you wait the proper long shaft if you eventually choose to upgrade.

[dremarquis]

thanks for all the input!

andre