HNI_Christine

Well, we got it running today but didn't take it out on the water. We expect a few stumbling blocks and we hit one today while working on the throttle control.
While revving the motor, the fan hub moved forward and wedged up against the motor. So we had to run to TSC and buy a gear puller.
I managed to resist buying chicks while I was there.
The gear puller worked well and the hub and motor don't seem any worse off.

So now, it seems good to go. There's some finish work and tweaking that needs to be done, but mostly we just want to get the thing on the water and see if it works. (to me the fan doesn't really seem to be moving that much air... but we will see.)

carpsniper

I gotta tell ya when I saw that, I felt a serious kick in the gut... OK well it rhymes with guts.

But the good thing was that even slid as far forward as possible, the blades won't hit the shroud. That's a VERY good thing. Even so when we were at TSC for the gear puller, C found that they had collars. (I thought I'd have to make one) So we put two on so even if it does slide again, it can't touch the block.

I can hardly wait to go try it out tomorrow. Like waiting for Christmas.

drifter_3057

thats looking pretty good,,,alot different than what i seen at new athens last yr.i have been toying around with the fan idea,,but havent been around one to see how or how well they work

carptracker

I gotta say, K, that even if you never shoot a fish off this thing, I am very impressed. Looks great. I think I remember one of those "reasons" for the fan by the way. Hope I get a chance to try the boat some day.

barrelslime

That looks great guys

carpsniper

Thanks Duane. Yeah I bet you do remember. That night was pretty interesting. I was sure embarrassed when the prop broke with no replacement.

Well we took her out today. I was pleased with the results. There were several times when I was thinking "Dang! We should have a troller." But when we were gliding over stuff that the troller would have been hitting, I was thinking "Man this is great!" Right up until the crimp connector on the steering cable came apart. But that's what we went for to find the kinks and get 'em worked out.

Mark S

Mental note: bring spare cable connectors along.

Were you happy with the thrust? Manuverability?

HNI_Christine

The fan had steering issues right off the bat.. slippage in the stick and then finally the cables coming undone. A touch of welding and recabling should take care of that.

At full throttle it was pushing us about 5 mph. At idle it was just about the same as our troller would pull us. We ran over a lot of brush and sticks in the water with ease. Kendall took the boat right into the trees which was perhaps a little too brave as the steering slippage and learning curve didn't make steering all that easy. (mostly because we had to keep looking at the fan to see which way it was pointed)
K did manage to avoid all the branches but we did hold our breath a few times.

When the cable collar came off we had to use the outboard to putt-putt our way out of the shallow stuff. The fish were far more scared of the outboard at idle speed than the fan at full blast.

Overall, it was a lot of fun and it we were very happy with the performance. (and the guys at the ramp thought it was just the coolest thing ever.) LOL.

It runs!

HNI_Christine

Mostly we were playing with the boat but we did get some shooting in too.

I got the first two fish I shot at, including this dinky gar. (my shot percentage rapidly went downhill from there)


K hit his first two in a row too.

This silver was splashing around with another silver like they were getting ready to spawn. ??

carpsniper

...and some cable also.

Yeah. I was real happy with the thrust. 4.9 mph on the GPS and I think it will go a bit over 5 when I get it tweaked.

Manuverability?, Well I think the cable slipped shortly after we started. But when it was going good, it was very manuverable. It is much more of a handful with a little breeze.

One other thing was a kill switch. I didn't wire one in. I will tomorrow.