We’ve probably all seen this video at some point in time, but if not here is a reminder of the importance of both a kill switch and life jackets/flotation devices. To summarize the video, an angler in an unstable bass boat, yes no boat should rock side to side like that, catches a wave wrong, becomes air borne, is ejected from the boat and knocked unconscious mere inches from the prop when he strikes the water. He is alive because he was using the proper safety equipment and following all the rules. At bit of bad judgment on his case to push that boat that hard IMO but he may not have known better. I see that boat rocking side to side like that in the 1st few frames and I begin to cringe. Bass boats are dangerous. We fish out of boats designed for maximum shallow draft while still having a low coefficient of drag by ass dragging in the water to reach speed boat levels of speed. Simply put, our boats are inherently dangerous so follow the safety rules for your own sake.
Man… that scares the crap out of me!!!! We ALWAYS have life jackets on and the kill switch hooked up anytime the big motor is on!!! I hope and pray that we don’t ever have to test them out like that guy!!!!
That’s a good video to show everyone that those 2 simple items can save your life if you lose control of your boat. On the other hand, the boater is an idiot for trying to jump that wake at that speed and going full throttle when there was that much chop on the water. There was one part of the video where it looked like he was having a hard time controlling his boat when he wasn’t going over a wave.
I think it’s time for boaters need to pass a common sense test before they are able to even buy the boat.
My father’s Javelin can handle some serious sized waves at those speeds and be sable as rock. I don’t like the way that boat moves in the water. That water was FAR from rough and yet he ended up airborne. I’d like know what make of boat and hull is in the video. I’ve only driven a Javelin, Stratos, bass tracker and ridden in few other I do not recall and none of therm moved like that. Maybe he had the trim set incorrectly? That boat was WAY out of the water and unstable throughout the vid.
My father’s Javelin can handle some serious sized waves at those speeds and be sable as rock. I don’t like the way that boat moves in the water. That water was FAR from rough and yet he ended up airborne. I’d like know what make of boat and hull is in the video. I’ve only driven a Javelin, Stratos, bass tracker and ridden in few other I do not recall and none of therm moved like that. Maybe he had the trim set incorrectly? That boat was WAY out of the water and unstable throughout the vid.
It looks a bit like an Allison. When your running a performance hull like that the pad is very small and you will have some chine walk. When I have my boat light and trimmed out and running I will get some walk also. He hit the wake of the other boat at a terrible angle and thats what cause his trouble. I hit a wake once on the Mississippi River from a Gambling barge. I didnt realize how big the wake was until I hit it, my boat was completly out of the water but I was able to put the boat into neutral before I hit the water I thought my boat was going to break in half I hit the water so hard. But I hit the throttle again and was off without a trouble. I know a guy who flipped his Ranger when he hit a wake on Kentucky Lake. He never say the wake and went straight up in the air, when his pprop hit the water it flipped him right over.
It’s hard to see it because of the poor quality video, but is says Dominator 202 on the side of it. It’s a Legend Dominator 202.
Thanks I confirmed the make lurking another forum. You have good eyes or just know your boats.
stick um - 30 January 2012 10:57 AM
TorqueConverter - 27 January 2012 03:59 PM
My father’s Javelin can handle some serious sized waves at those speeds and be sable as rock. I don’t like the way that boat moves in the water. That water was FAR from rough and yet he ended up airborne. I’d like know what make of boat and hull is in the video. I’ve only driven a Javelin, Stratos, bass tracker and ridden in few other I do not recall and none of therm moved like that. Maybe he had the trim set incorrectly? That boat was WAY out of the water and unstable throughout the vid.
It looks a bit like an Allison. When your running a performance hull like that the pad is very small and you will have some chine walk. When I have my boat light and trimmed out and running I will get some walk also. He hit the wake of the other boat at a terrible angle and thats what cause his trouble. I hit a wake once on the Mississippi River from a Gambling barge. I didnt realize how big the wake was until I hit it, my boat was completly out of the water but I was able to put the boat into neutral before I hit the water I thought my boat was going to break in half I hit the water so hard. But I hit the throttle again and was off without a trouble. I know a guy who flipped his Ranger when he hit a wake on Kentucky Lake. He never say the wake and went straight up in the air, when his pprop hit the water it flipped him right over.
Thanks for the info. I’ve heard of chine walk but have never seen it. If I experience chine walk I now know to back the hell off the throttle or end up like that guy or worse. I’m an outsider to chine walk so it seems very odd for a boat to exhibit that behavior on the water. I know for fact I have jumped wakes and big waves produced by storm conditions at the speed he hit that, in my opinion, little wake and the Javelin has been rock solid. I know Javys are heavy and have a large contact patch so I have been fortunate because I’ve been guilty of dumb crap like you see in the video lots of times at the boats top speed of 70ish. I think I’ll stop doing that now.
I’m curious. Do you guys think chine walking is acceptable in bass boats? It sounds like a design and engineering problem that the manufactures are forcing us to live with. I frankly wouldn’t buy a boat that achieves high speeds at the cost of chine walk. It’s like buying a car that is highly prone to becoming airborne or flying off the road when you break the speed limit.
It’s hard to see it because of the poor quality video, but is says Dominator 202 on the side of it. It’s a Legend Dominator 202.
Thanks I confirmed the make lurking another forum. You have good eyes or just know your boats.
stick um - 30 January 2012 10:57 AM
TorqueConverter - 27 January 2012 03:59 PM
My father’s Javelin can handle some serious sized waves at those speeds and be sable as rock. I don’t like the way that boat moves in the water. That water was FAR from rough and yet he ended up airborne. I’d like know what make of boat and hull is in the video. I’ve only driven a Javelin, Stratos, bass tracker and ridden in few other I do not recall and none of therm moved like that. Maybe he had the trim set incorrectly? That boat was WAY out of the water and unstable throughout the vid.
It looks a bit like an Allison. When your running a performance hull like that the pad is very small and you will have some chine walk. When I have my boat light and trimmed out and running I will get some walk also. He hit the wake of the other boat at a terrible angle and thats what cause his trouble. I hit a wake once on the Mississippi River from a Gambling barge. I didnt realize how big the wake was until I hit it, my boat was completly out of the water but I was able to put the boat into neutral before I hit the water I thought my boat was going to break in half I hit the water so hard. But I hit the throttle again and was off without a trouble. I know a guy who flipped his Ranger when he hit a wake on Kentucky Lake. He never say the wake and went straight up in the air, when his pprop hit the water it flipped him right over.
Thanks for the info. I’ve heard of chine walk but have never seen it. If I experience chine walk I now know to back the hell off the throttle or end up like that guy or worse. I’m an outsider to chine walk so it seems very odd for a boat to exhibit that behavior on the water. I know for fact I have jumped wakes and big waves produced by storm conditions at the speed he hit that, in my opinion, little wake and the Javelin has been rock solid. I know Javys are heavy and have a large contact patch so I have been fortunate because I’ve been guilty of dumb crap like you see in the video lots of times at the boats top speed of 70ish. I think I’ll stop doing that now.
I’m curious. Do you guys think chine walking is acceptable in bass boats? It sounds like a design and engineering problem that the manufactures are forcing us to live with. I frankly wouldn’t buy a boat that achieves high speeds at the cost of chine walk. It’s like buying a car that is highly prone to becoming airborne or flying off the road when you break the speed limit.
Chine walk is the result of to much trim, where the boat is falling off the pad. It’s not a design problem at all. Good boat drivers know that you can steer through it and be on your way. Is it acceptable? Well I guess that depends on how much the race is worth. Personally I just trim my boat down when this starts, which puts more of the boat in the water thus eliminating any instability . But in a tournament when you have a 30+ mile run, speed results to fishing time. Just drive within your abilities and be courteous to other boaters.
Some boats tend to walk more than others, if you never learn to control the walk you will never get the most performance out of your boat. Its the nature of the beast. Most of the time small left hand turns will put the boat back on track. There are some good videos on youtube about it.
^ Ah, maybe that’s why I have never experienced chine walk. I ride with trim most if not all the way down and with 2nd person the the boat like 99% of the time.
The guy obviously:
Shouldn’t be driving a boat
Didn’t know the capabilities of his boat
Has something set up wrong (maybe he exceeded the HP rating, but it doesn’t look that “fast”, it just looks sloppy)
Is one lucky person to have been wearing KS/LF and had someone watching
What he did was very wrong as squirrely as that boat looked with what I’d consider very minimal chop compared to most days I’ve been on the water.
