Ski Boat Design Ideas

[MCskiFreak]

Hello all,

 

I am a young Naval Architecture student and for the past few years I have been giving a great deal of thought of starting a ski boat company along with several other engineers and designers.

 

I would greatly appreciate any ideas or comments from members of what they would like to see on a ski boat in the future.

[ForrestGump]

A stripper pole?

[MCskiFreak]

serious design and innovation related ideas please!

[Old MS Accout]

Awesome MC. I will be the first to buy if,

1. Price, you need to not break the (my) bank. (under 25K)

2. Wakes will not get better, so dont waste alot of time and $ trying to make it smaller

3. Quality control. Make it last so it retains its value.

4. Made in the USA

5. Dont screw the waterski world and sign an exclusive deal with ZO or the like.

   

[Razorskier1]

I agree with MS.  Build a quality boat and price it right.  I'd even say $30k is OK given the current prices for the "big 3", which are obscenely outside the budget of almost every skier in America.  On the interior focus on the ergonomics for the driver, observer, and skier.  It sounds dumb, but some of the boats out there (Malibu) have really lousy driver ergonomics.  The throttle and wheel position and forward visibility relative to seating position suck.  Still pulls a nice slalom set, but I don't want to drive it.  Given that the wakes are so good across the board, it really comes down to doing these little things right to make a boat great. 

[Craig]

1) Fund your company with some other product aside from ski boat sales. 

The trouble with a good ski boat is that you will not sell enough of them to keep your company floating (no pun intended).  That part of the reason why the other inboard ski boat companies have 'improved' their 'ski' boats into 3000lb OB ski/wake machines.   The only advantage to a larger machine, aside from some creature comforts, is that they drive/track better (not all, but in general).

I will admit that the creature comforts in new boats make them look sharp.  The wake on my 94 MC 190 is better than anything you can buy new, but a new SN 200 could probably take a dump and it would look almost as good.  Not that the 190 is ugly, but the 200 would probably have some good looking dumps.

If you made a line of runabouts, or something similar, you could sell to regular boaters (lots of them) for a nice profit margin you could use this to fund ski boat development (very few of them).

2)  Keep it simple, sell it cheap.

 It amazes me when I read about people on the MC forum dropping $90k on a brand new x-star only to spend half the summer with it in the shop to get little BS fixed that should have never left the factory like that.  If they didn't have to add all the junk to the boat to justify the price, that is a non-issue, so keep it simple.

[ForrestGump]

MS, I think $25k is a pipe dream considering that there are some seriously expensive pieces that have to be a part of a boat. The engine and transmission cost is going to be $8k-$10k for a base engine/transmission/ mount system.  Add cruise control and electronics, running gear, windshields(which are $1500 from Taylor on average) and you have eaten up $25k in hard parts pretty quickly with nothing left over for labor.  I think a more realistic price now days would be a base boat with trailer for $35k. That can realistically be done. The first Ski Nautique I bought in 1996 was $24,500 with trailer. That was for a base boat with single axle trailer, 260hp carb'd 351, no stereo, etc. Adjusted for inflation, that is $35000 today. 

[MCskiFreak]

The idea that I have is to make the best engineered and best looking boat that I can while still making it so the average joe can afford it.

 

The Company will not solely focus on the ski boat alone, I hope to do custom tenders for yachts, as well as running a small design house that would allow for custom orders that could be made by other builders.

 

I do understand that just a core ski/ or wake boat would not make for a profitable company.

[Dirt]

Ditto what MS said! Maybe a 91 MC same horsepower but fuel injected.

[Jody_Seal]

I should probably refrain from this one! /vanillaforum/js/tinymce/jscripts/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/images/smiley-laughing.gif But the stripper poll! Ya ! Bring it!

[Horton]

Forget that you have to sell more than 5 . . .

I would start with an early 90s MC. Or CC before they got fat.

We do not need a huge boat or a massive engine to move it.

It does not need to be able to pull jump. Most of us do not jump. No need for all of us to ski behind the Queen Mary so one guy can jump.

It needs to have a little give – not overpowered

I needs to drive well. (this is the strange part…. No two boats from the same mold seem to drive the same. There are always little things. I hate that.)

It needs to track well

I needs to use whatever cruise control the other boats use. Hate it but resistances is futile.

Once you settle on a smaller boat with a smaller engine then you can make the wakes smaller. You can not forget spray but I do not think that is hard. As a shortline skier I honestly do no notice wakes by my wife does.  Wifes and kids need to be happy.

Smaller - Lighter - Cheaper

[Horton]

No stripper pole. That is for wakeboard boats.

[Horton]

I voiced this to someone at MasterCraft a few years ago. (not the part about the stripper pole) The answer I got was, they sell more boats because they are big and open bow.

[Bulldog]

Like it or not the people on this forum are not the ones keeping the boat companies in business. It is wally wakeboarder and his 90K+ boat with the bling…. Go to any public lake and you will always see that guy with the 18 inch rims on his SUV and boat trailer….his boat will be rad man with HUGE wake. Thanks to those guys we can still have a slalom boat or three to pick from, they keep the wheels at the factories turning. Look at how many wake board boats they all make compared to ski boats. Sad but true.

[ForrestGump]

Damnit man.......you're killing me with this no stripper pole thing.  Do I have to shelf the slalom and start wakeboarding now?!?!

In all seriousness, though, the 93 MC hull would be a great start. That's the size we need. Plus all the other stuff that Horton mentioned. You have two hurdles to climb. One is that you cannot certify a hull as slalom only under the current towboat policy at the AWSA. They have to be 3 event boats. Next, and possibly even a bigger issue is that you have to pull 20% of the tournaments in a region to qualify for regionals and pull 20% of the tournaments in all 5 regions to qualify for nationals.  Even Centurion, with the financial backing they have, is going to have a difficult time with this.  So a startup is definitely going to have issues with this. And until you can overcome that, it's going to be difficult to make inroads in the tournament ski boat market. 

[Bulldog]

ShaneH I love your idea maybe thats why I use a 10 foot pole for the kids instead of a tower…I had not thought of using it as a pole for the ladies to dance with - NICE... There is a very small market for the boat companies to make money in slalom, jump, and trick compared to wakeboarding with all of the bling (huge profits, do board racks really cost that much to make?) it sucks but it is reality.

[Horton]

"you cannot certify a hull as slalom only under the current towboat policy at the AWSA."

Maybe it is time for the membership for freak out and change this. Food for thought most of us ski tounraments mostly Class C. I really do not see why we need current year boats for this. Gimmie an old boat any day.

______________________________________________________________________________________________

As Admin... I want to give the floor back to  MCskiFreak 

Did we answer your question at all? 

[Old MS Accout]

Shane,

Makes sense. It doesnt take long to get to 25K. You would think the price of all the materials would start comming down with the slow economy. Order up a 200 with the stripper pole and you could have one of your lady friends do dances for tips that would fund the boat. Might work inbetween sets.

I am not with all you guys on this 90s MC stuff. rock size spray in the eyeballs at 35 off is a killer. The wake would be a great start but some spray knockers are needed.    

[6balls]

MS, I thought '91-'94 added the spray relief pockets, the EFI, and kept the nice wake.  Prior to that is the golf balls for sure on both sides of an otherwise nice wake from an underpowered boat.  I don't think the old MC's track as well as a '97 and newer 196, though.  I love my '00 196 w/GT40 as a basic slalom boat attained at reasonable cost with good build quality.  Only downside is no ZO.

Shane...for you:

http://www.lilmynx.com/lilmynxwakepole.php

 

[Old MS Accout]

My neighbor sold his 94 last spring. We used it before my promo would be delivered and after it sold in the fall. 35 off into the wind would take your sockets out if you did not have shades on. Awesome track and wake though.   

[ForrestGump]

Thanks 6Balls! Now I know where to find one for my bedroom too! hehehe

[RichardDoane]

MS - I agree, brutal shortline side spray from my '92 MC was one of the reasons I finally replaced it last season

[Kelvin]

Shane, now your gonna have to get a Sport 200 to make room for the pole.

[eyepeeler]

Bring back the Response LX!  Light and fuel efficient.  Malibu should bring back the Response LX for it's promo boat.

[Laz]

Sounds like you are describing a Moomba Outback. Price is just over $30k. It is well built, simple and does not come with any bling.

I just spent a week skiing behind a SN 200 and then spent some time in a Moomba and SN200 at the boat show. The Nautique is almost double the price even though the Moomba price includes the trailer. I ski into 28' off, so I still have a lot to learn before I can blame the wake for any missed buoys.

Now the 200 was one beautiful boat and is certainly very shiny. But for me, my hacker ski buddies and my money (I work for a living) I cannot justify the extra $30 000 spent on the Nautique. That money can sure buy a lot of gas, skis and trips to Florida.

P.S. I the closed bow Response LX is still available, just not advertised.

[eleeski]

Price is all that really matters. As long as the boat works. Light weight is cool and easy to tow. Plus you can add ballast without sinking the boat. Jump capability is critical but overreving the engine for those few seconds of jump power need is OK (2 speed transmission?). A great trick and wakeboard wake is also critical. Right now only 3 companies even try. A cheap boat is worthless if it isn't at tournaments. Oh, it needs a bubbler! Eric

[auskier]

the response lx is our primary 3 event boat down here in aus.

however it does not fit into the 'cheap' category. with ZO, delivery bimini etc, the bare essentials you are looking at 60k easily. At the moment that equals 60k USD!!! IMO it is 15k too expensive.

[ForrestGump]

The interesting thing is that the big 3 offered a bare bones cheaper boat in the sportstar, sportster and SN176  and no one bought them.  As was said, the response lx is still available and I think I heard that malibu sold 13 last year. 

[DW]

Lots of excellent points listed in this thread.  The tournament ski boat market is going to be very difficult to penetrate with a new entry as the group tends to be very brand loyal, pretty easy to see even in this thread.  That is a great thing for the current "top 3", a challenge for the new entry.  I would focus on some key differentiators for your product such as a better wake, lower price, better tracking.  I think there are improvements to be made in the wake, sounds like you intend to be engineering focused so that should help.  A couple threads on this forum also demonstrate that there are successful wake improvement ideas still to be implemented.   There are tools available today that can help in that area such as CFD and other modeling tools.  The current hulls are very good, but as noted all the new boats are quite heavy so an excellent hull on a light boat would provide a competitive advantage to rival offerings.  The Centurion CP appears to be trying that strategy.  A boat I thought quite innovative was the Infinity, there were numerous interesting engineering improvements/ideas on that boat compared to what existed at the time.  That would also be a good example of how difficult the market is to gain a foothold as Infinity even had a world class designer as a selling point, something I certainly would not underestimate given the infatuation with celebrity that exists.

In the end, the boat itself might not be the most difficult part of the puzzle, it could be the dealer network, supply, parts, transportation or financing to make the dream come true.

[skibug]

Exposure, perception, and acceptance are the biggest obstacles to overcome.  When Malibu broke onto the scene in the mid 90's, with the Response, they had a great hull design that had a superior wake; and, a price point that was digestable.  They recieved a lot of exposure by winning "tow boat of the year" for about 6 or 7 years in a row if I remember correctly.  This is where they became estabilshed.  Good product, right place at the right time helped a lot too.

I will be interested to see how Carbon Pro is recieved.  It is a bare bones boat; but, very functional and the performace is on par to the "big three".  You should be able to get a stripped down version in the low to mid $30's (w/Z0).  So who is stepping up to be the first to buy one? 

[jedgell]

From what I've seen the Carbon Pro will not be in the low to mid 30's.  The promo price is much closer to $40K and was essentially a basic boat with ZO.  No heater, shower, bimini, cover, etc.  It does have a tandem trailer and I think a stereo so there could be some savings there, but not much.  When I compared a similarly equipped CP and 200 CB (both promo's) the price difference was about $7K.

[MCskiFreak]

Sorry I haven't had time to reply to every ones ideas! Thank you all very much for your input!

 

The design of the boat will be highly engineering focused, but one big thing that has been lacking in a lot of new boats from all manufacturers is properly good looks which is something that I do intend to address. The boats will be kept light both with respect to size and with the use of more advanced manufacturing techniques than what the big 3 are willing to use.

 

This doesn't mean that I will be going with an antiquated design though, I do have some new and innovative ideas that I would like to try and implement.

 

I know that this will not be an easy road, but it has been a dream for many years now, and dreams usually aren't easy to achieve.

[kpickett]

Fuel economy! Gas is supposed to get back to $4/gallon this summer and maybe $5 by next summer. This is already an expensive sport and the barrier to entry is going to get much higher in the years to come as gas prices continue to rise.

 

Electric motors for boats that run on private lakes make a lot of sense. Smaller engines, more efficient, etc.

[dleenhouts]

I've always been curious about putting in a 3-speed transmission to cut down on fuel consumption at 36 mph. Probably tricky, and it is another thing that can break, but you're the engineer - make it happen!

[DanE]

If you´re interested in selling outside the US - as in Europe, FUEL ECONOMY for sure.

Gas price in most countries in EU is 7 if not close to  8 Us $ a gallon

[ForrestGump]

dleenhouts, one ofthe issues with a multispeed trans in a ski boat is that there aren't any that are reliable when shifted at full throttle under load. A prop puts a tremendous load on a trans in a situation like that. ZF and BorgWarner have both played with it, but they quickly found that to make it reliable made it cost prohibitive and bulky.

[skier2788]

I have wondered about a constant velocity transmission instead of the normal planetary gear set that they currently use. That would eliminate the need for a shift at full throttle. I dont think they handle a lot of torque very well so they could fail. I am just a mechanic not an engineer like you guys so I don't know. This is a little off topic but instead of building a whole boat I wish someone would offer a relatively affordable engine upgrade kit. I could take my old boat and for about 8K I could put in a new fuel injected motor with an ecm and wire it all up. I dont see where it would be that hard of an install but in my little bit of research on it, the parts are currently way too high. I am with some of the others on here I still love my old hull just wish I could have ZO on it.

[Andre]

Anyone heard anything about Andy Mapple skiing an electric motor 196 in Fla a couples of weeks ago?

Asking because i'm not sure if my infos are good...

[clemsondave]

An electric ski boat does exist. In fact, they have recently built one with a pretty impressive hull. Can't give any details until they allow it, but they are throwing some pretty big dollars at it. Pretty far off topic here due to the price of the motors. We're a LONG way from it being cost effective.

[Bruce_Butterfield]

The 2 things that cause the most grief to skiers and speed control guys are 1) prop slippage and 2) reduction in engine rpm when the skier loads.  A good solution, and one that I think would be a huge improvement for both slalom and jump, would be a high torque engine (turbo diesel) tied to a pair of very large props.  There is a show skier somewhere up north who made transmission to drive 2 props from one engine.  A great idea with some obvious implementation challenges.

 This is the most practical way to ever get close to "constant speed" that the rulebook calls out and makes the speed control's job very easy - the boat won't even notice the skier's pulls.

 Yes, there will be a sizeable weight and cost penalty for the diesel, but if you are looking for innovative engineering solutions, this is at the top of my list. 

[Hugh Nichols]

MC, How about a boat that runs on Compressed Natural Gas? Good clean burning fuel, and my favorite word, cheap! 

[Chuck_Dickey]

Here's the twin prop job BB was mentioning.

http://lh6.ggpht.com/_4-6ay9R-bLE/TS_dtlyQzpI/AAAAAAAAFAc/sHIJd8mNAfM/s800/twinscrewMC.jpg

[skibug]

no offense meant; but wouldn't the pull from a super high torque motor / transmission give you a pull that feels even more like a freight train?  That is what I am thinking.  The reason for the acceleration curves is to compensate for the load applied by the skier and conversely to compensate for when there isn't load.

[boarditup]

Karel Wolters, a friend and fellow skier, is the inventor of the twin rig.  It does pull like a freight train.  However, you can downsize the motor to get a good pull.  For his twin rig, he has a 340 hp motor that has pulled over 20 show skiers from a deep water start.  Aside from the traction, the tracking is laser precise and the boat backs up like a stern drive.  I have slalomed behind it without an issue - it performs well.

He as a transmission on the table right now ready to install in a boat.  Send me an e mail if you are interested.  Figure about $15k for parts and labor.

[ForrestGump]

Damn, that twin prop rig would track like it was on rails! I'm seeing some distinct possibilities with that arrangement.  By halfing the load applied per prop, your slip goes down and would allow you to swing considerably different props than we're accustomed to now. I'm thinking you could get to a point where the speed control wouldn't have to vary the throttle angle but instead could instruct the engine to vary the timing advance to control the rpm delta, much like we do when we're tuning a race engine at idle with today's programmable ecu's. 

[DanE]

Bruce,  it doesnt matter how high torque engine you put in - it won´t develop any more torque x rpm than needed to travel any certain speed under a certain load. No skier load - low power output from engine, add skier load - output power from engine will increase with the help of speed control.

Todays engines have more than ample power to pull a slalom skier through the course, think about what would happen if you slammed wot when the skier is crossing the wakes- that´s the kind of power we have access to already.

Problem is, there have to be some speed or rpm deviation for the speed control to recognize something is happening behind the boat. I can imagine if the boats went smaller and lighter the speed swing would increase unless sc becomes faster to react. I believe speed swing is what the skier is experiencing as the boat "gassing" therefore less speed swing would actually feel softer imho.

[Roger]

Skier2788 said "This is a little off topic but instead of building a whole boat I wish someone would offer a relatively affordable engine upgrade kit. I could take my old boat and for about 8K I could put in a new fuel injected motor with an ecm and wire it all up."

Give PCM a call. They sell refurbished engines that have been swapped out on warranty. They repair whatever was wrong and then re-sell the engine (I believe with a limited warranty). Kris LaPoint told me he re-powered his boat this way for about $6500.00 (including wiring and ZO).

[Bruce_Butterfield]

 

Dan, you need to think in terms of Hp being a measure of an engine's ability to accelerate and the torque as a measure of its ability to maintain rpm under load. So if you have an engine that outputs 100 ft-lb of torque at ski speed and a strong skier pulls hard, the rpm will drop like a rock. If you have an engine that outputs 1000 ft-lbs of torque at ski speed and the skier pulls the same, the rpm will stay nearly constant.

 

The combination of high Hp boats and speed controls are part of the problem - the speed control reacts to a reduction in speed and the engine is capable responding with LOTS of acceleration. As the boat tries to return to "constant" speed, it is the acceleration that makes the pull feel so damn hard. If we had the proverbial tug boat that was capable of maintaining a very constant speed under load, the pull would feel very soft compared to ZO

 

Put another way, the freight train doesn't care if there a skier back there or not, so its pull will feel much softer than the pull from the drag racer trying to recover 1mph in a fraction of a second.

[DanE]

Yes, I agree it´s the acceleration that the skier feels in the rope and that a freight train pull would probably be the softest ever.

But in order to make an engine put out lots of power so the skiers pull will be insignificant it´s gonna take a boat that requiers lots of power just to reach skier speed on it´s own = lots of wasted fuel.

Now, one could add engine torque by having the engine turn less rpm for a given speed, not sure what that would do to the boats ability to hold speed ? Even if the engine is capable of putting out high torque and has a flat torque curve to aid in it´s ability to maintain high torq at low rpm, you still have to apply more throttle to make it do so when the load goes up (skier pulls), that goes for any engine.

[Horton]

Chuck,

I have see that image a number of times. Are we sure it is a boat and not fun with photoshop?