Trolling Plate for stern drive I/O

[tool]

I was gifted an older 18' run about last fall which I am hoping to take on some fishing adventures this year. It's an '89 18' Regal Bowrider with a 4.3 Mercruiser I/O

I don't see this being my "forever boat" so I'm not sure if I want to invest in an electric trolling setup or not but would like to do some trolling, the I/O's are typically too fast for this so I've been considering trying one of the "trolling plate" setups that seem to be readily available.

Anybody ever use one of these?

Is it worth it and how did it work?

[mlee]

I have a large happy troller plate on my boat.
It's a 175 fish and ski with a 115hp outboard. I did re-prop as well but with the plate down I'm at about 1.1mph at 750rpm vs about 2mph with the plate up at the same rpm. It did wat I wanted it to do so I'm happy with $200 I spent.

[-JR-]

I had an older inboard that had a carb. I wanted that 2 mph speed so i just adjusted the low idle throttle stop to that speed .

[tool]

Originally Posted by -JR-

I had an older inboard that had a carb. I wanted that 2 mph speed so i just adjusted the low idle throttle stop to that speed .

Interesting, this boat is carbed as well. Worth a try I guess. You didn't have issues with it wanting to stall when you are shifting from neutral into forward or reverse?

Maybe first I should get it out and idle around and see what speed it's actually doing with my phone gps or something.

[-JR-]

No it ran really good .

[TROLLER]

DRIFT SOCK

They come in a few different sizes, but are very effective. I use a small one on my new 14ft.

My fishn bud uses one on his 17 with a 115hp outboard and no issues trolling 1.6-1.8 MPH They sell em at Bass and most are around $50

[tool]

I've thought about trying a drift sock as well.

Behind our 17' Glastron with 150 Johnson Fast Strike Outboard I would drag two 5 gallon buckets with holes drilled in them. It was only marginally effective. We still caught fish but it was definitely going faster than ideal.

I'd wonder about the drift sock getting tangled in your prop though?

The buckets I'd tie to the mooring lines on either side of the boat, helped some but not enough to be ideal.

[HL_transplant]

Drift sock tied off the bow. Always worked well for me no need to drag it behind the boat. A medium sized drift sock slowed us down .5 mph but there are bigger sizes for sure.

[tool]

Yeah I'll have to get it in the water and get a baseline. I see Cabelas has them for pretty reasonable price. Then have to just guess how much you want to slow down I guess.

18" to 48" is quite a range in size.

I guess if you had a bigger one you could just use more throttle to overcome the sock, might give you a wider range of useable trolling speed.

[-JR-]

Even a 20 L pail will slow you down.

[mlee]

I'll mention before I bought the trolling plate I messed with drift docks. The fact I put a trolling plate on should tell you how satisfied I was using socks.

[tool]

Like I said, I drug 2 5 gallon pails and it made only a slight difference on our Glastron

[TROLLER]

You want a larger sock and add some line to it so you never have t o worry about getting tangled up with your prop.

I have the smallest on my 14 and no issue slowing to 1to 1.2 mph. Only use it when my battery gives out or have an issue with my bow troller but it is always in my boat and has saved many a day fishing, especially when the wind is not friendly towars my bow troller.