smart tabs trim tabs

[checkmate1984]

Has anyone used these smart tabs? I have an 1984 ambassador 260 I/O 19'6" I have no hydrofoil It takes afew for the nose to come down at good throttle but im mostly just cruising around at low rpm and would love to see the water and not the sky has anyone used smart tabs or could you recamend a good hydrofoil?

 

[Rob B]

Has anyone used these smart tabs? I have an 1984 ambassador 260 I/O 19'6" I have no hydrofoil It takes afew for the nose to come down at good throttle but im mostly just cruising around at low rpm and would love to see the water and not the sky has anyone used smart tabs or could you recamend a good hydrofoil?

I've got bennett trim tabs on my Enforcer others run Lenco trim tabs, try this before you add tabs: http://www.bobsmachine.com/Products/transom_stabilizer.cfm

 

[wca_tim]

They're inexpensive and can help, but I unless you have someone driving your boat that is just learning or not very ummm with it on that sort of thing, I'd go straight to decent helm adjustables.

I put a set of the sport tabs on my boat to help with bowrise and porpoising and they did help a lot. I was teaching my daughter to drive the boat at the time and didn't want to add another degree of complexity for her at that stage.

I broke the sport tabs off - both of them in one day skipping across about 1 foot chop at 65 or 70. The company was very good to work with and provided a set of the more expensive stainless ones for the price of shipping... They worked about as well. I wound up breaking one of them late last year (after about a year on the boat). I'm not exactly "easy" on things... I already had a set of bennets to put on so that's what is on there now and I couldn't be more pleased....

Hope this is helpful. Cheers, Tim

 

[JimK]

The forum for my "other boat" has had exhaustive discussion of the Smart Tabs (vs. manual-adjusted, etc) and it seems to boil down to that those with boats under 20' love their Smart Tabs (easy and effective) while the 22'+ go with Bennet or Lenco. I would think with your V8-power/weight, you would get better results with manual-adjust but Smart tabs would be cheaper/easier and OK??

 

[checkmate1984]

Has anyone used these smart tabs? I have an 1984 ambassador 260 I/O 19'6" I have no hydrofoil It takes afew for the nose to come down at good throttle but im mostly just cruising around at low rpm and would love to see the water and not the sky has anyone used smart tabs or could you recamend a good hydrofoil?

well i just installed a se sport hydrofoil doesnt seem to plane any faster and it leans to port over 30 mph it sets very level on the outdrive thinking about taking it off.

 

[checkmate1984]

thanks i also tried an se sport hydrofoil and i didnt like it didnt seem to do much for the boat, And it leans to port over 30 mph

 

[wca_tim]

I think any of the hydrofoils are asking fore trouble for a lot of reasons... that's a whole different deal than tabs

 

[redsput]

I put a set of smart tabs (the stainless versions) on my Starfire (18' v8). Originally went with the 80 lb actuators as reccommended. Way too stiff - the mate wouldn't raise it's bow. After many adjustments, and replacing the 80 lb actuators with 60 lb , (no change from Nauticus) I now have it "dialed" in by backing off to about 20 degees down, softest pressure. Better holeshot, basically eliminated porpoise, and really helped when slowing - to reduce the tendency of washing a big wave over the back. Overall I lost maybe 1 mph, but it's much better behaved everywhere else. If I had to do it over (and I had the extra $) I'd go with helm adjustable, but for my "SMALLER" boat, at about 1/4 the price of a nice adjustable set, these have really worked out nice.