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Surfgate question?


malibu03lxi

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I have a 2003 response lxi and i am in the making of a surfgate. I have had several successful sessions with the gate on. I have 800lbs in the back of the boat and the wedge down. One problem i believe that is causing the wake to be not as successful as when i weight the boat on the port side is with the gate on and surfing is my steering wheel is turned a full turn to the left to continue a straight path. Is this how everyone else is when surfing with a gate, homemade gate or with a new wakesetter? Is there a solution to this? Also what is the angle of the gate that is best? straight up and down or angled in closer to the center of the boat at the bottom of the boat like this / Thanks

Zach

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Has anyone modified their manual wedge to a different angle to give it more force downward since i am only going 10mph when surfing? The wedge is rated at 1000lbs of downward pressure at 23mph when wakeboarding. I am thinking that changing the angle by 5 or 10 degrees at 10mph will give me extra downward pressure without adding more ballast. I have read several times in these forums with people that have power wedges that they move the wedge the whole way down, then they hit the power wedge two clicks up. Am I thinking in the right direction?

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Has anyone modified their manual wedge to a different angle to give it more force downward since i am only going 10mph when surfing? The wedge is rated at 1000lbs of downward pressure at 23mph when wakeboarding. I am thinking that changing the angle by 5 or 10 degrees at 10mph will give me extra downward pressure without adding more ballast. I have read several times in these forums with people that have power wedges that they move the wedge the whole way down, then they hit the power wedge two clicks up. Am I thinking in the right direction?

Yes, I experimented with this by drilling new stopping points for my floating wedge and playing with spacers. I had some success but have gone back to the stock position. Like everything, the best spot depended on how many people were out with us that day and how it was weighted. That's the beauty of the power wedge I guess.

If you have a floating wedge, then an easy way to try this is to add a round spacer (like something cutout with a hole saw), get a longer bolt and use the stock holes. Then the wedge hits the spacer first before the bolt, creating a steeper angle. Hope I'm describing this right. I tried it with a piece of teak, probably 2" or so in diameter.

  • Like 2
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I have the same prob on my '00 sunsetter lxi. Due to the difficulty steering, spray from the gate, and my stepped transom I am currently designing an nss type gate. I hope to have a prototype before putting away for the winter, but the fall has come quick and hard so I'm doubtful I will have time and most likely will wait until next spring. There are a bunch of threads on planetnautique forum.

  • Like 1
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My surf gate on my 2014 A20 requires you to compensate for the gate being extended with the steering wheel. One of the knocks against gated boats vs listed is that gated feels like you're driving sideways down the lake.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Edited by pook77
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  • 6 months later...

I have a 2003 response lxi and i am in the making of a surfgate. I have had several successful sessions with the gate on. I have 800lbs in the back of the boat and the wedge down. One problem i believe that is causing the wake to be not as successful as when i weight the boat on the port side is with the gate on and surfing is my steering wheel is turned a full turn to the left to continue a straight path. Is this how everyone else is when surfing with a gate, homemade gate or with a new wakesetter? Is there a solution to this? Also what is the angle of the gate that is best? straight up and down or angled in closer to the center of the boat at the bottom of the boat like this / Thanks

Zach

Dude I have an 04 response lxi, same model as urs I believe. I have tried everything to get the money surf setup, and its been driving me f'n crazy. I Would love to compare our setups! Im also planning to do real surf gate with martin archers control system this spring.

Im in IL and I have turned our LXI into as much of a wakeboard boat as is possible. First I upgraded from the hi fly extended pylon, to a Monster tower which I installed.

I have the normal "non floating" wedge that is typical for our model -its either locked in the up or down/engaged position.

Back of the boat gets a 1500lb couch shaped fast sack (i pulled that seat cushion out from the back floor area), front open bow gets an 650 lb A shaped bag . I have a 300lb hot dog shaped bag that usually goes in the middle of the boat, just in front of the pylon when wakeboarding. This bag used to get moved over to the drivers side when we surfed... more on that below.

I have two 155lb bricks to help move around in an effort to help dial the wake in, but we really haven't used them much yet...

With that setup i can surf without the handle some times, but certainly cannot rip without needing someone to throw me the handle. Things needed to get better.

So I made the poor man's surf gate and We had one pretty good day with that, but we had s*** ton of people on the boat as well. i have video on Facebook (note to self FB post date of 8/12/13). I can show u of my cuz surfing way further back than we have ever had before. We had the hot dog bag positioned for wakeboarding. At this point I start figuring that the surf gate is the KEY to getting this ski boat up to par for my style.

Last season was spent doing a semi automatic ballast system install (that stil has to get fixed) and a new taller boat house. We dinged the prop so I got the largest version available on wake makers for our boat. Made a super difference to hiw thr boat gets out of the hole with all that ballast, and my top end was fine too so deep water barefoot starts should also be good to go.

This years project, (other than perfecting my pump setup I jacked up due to some bad info seen on this website[emoji22] ), is to get some martin archer automatic surf gates installed. I have the lenco 102 actuators and some stainless hinges, just need to figure out how to get them mounted to our curved hull without killing her. I had the gas tank out and will again very soon much to my cousin/helpers dismay[emoji48]. Hope u r interested in sharing notes on ur setup!

Edited by rebelinc
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  • 3 months later...

Any updates on this setup? My wife wants to do a little surfing, would like to see if anyone has rigged a portable gate to an 03-06 RLxi.

Thanks!

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Any updates on this setup? My wife wants to do a little surfing, would like to see if anyone has rigged a portable gate to an 03-06 RLxi.

Thanks!

Actually gave up on the surfgate till 2 weeks ago when my dad and i said lets give it another shot. This is what it looks like with 450lbs in back ski locker, 400lb behind engine on floor, and 3 people average 145lbs each. Last sunday we had 9 people in boat, and 400 in back locker and 400 in center ski locker and the surf gate was awesome, and made a big wave. water level was about 2-3 inches below rub rail at the back sides where the malibu emblem. wave had lots of push and super clean.

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Looks great. Could u post some pics of ur surf gate install? Curious to know if ur on the poor mans surf gate (mounted to teak wood) or full out archer style automatic surf gate using lenco actuators.

I have the poor mans surf gate and it needs to be adjusted if not entirely replaced. Ill get photos and dims of mine when i get back to the boat. Here is the video of our wake as promised and described in my post above.

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I have a few pieces of wood screwed together clamped to the platform at this point. Before I do anymore I am going to remove the vents in the back and glue some thin Plexiglas on the inside of them and put the vents back in. I get a ton of water that comes in them when moving and I gotta run the bilge at the end of the session to empty water out from the engine area. If this solves the problem then I am going to go further into this and make it more professional. I will get you dimensions by the end of the weekend.

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martinarcher

Great thread guys. The steering with the gate bolted to the platform after coming off plane is what drove me to automate my gates and create a controller other guys could use. The first night we had the pine board gate bolted to the platform we ended up putting the boat back on the trailer with it still attached to the swim platform. I back the truck in and my wife puts the boat on the trailer. She told me she would never drive the boat with the gate again after that night so I started on an automated solution! Gotta keep her happy. :lol: I think the smaller DD boats like ours really pronounce the steering issues with a deployed gate where the bigger, heavier V-Drive boats aren't affected as much.

Both those waves look great behind those LXI's! Very nice!

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Thanks for the dims. Ill be at my lake this weekend and will let u know my dims, but mine is cranked soo much i can barely veer right let alone turn.

I dont think ive ever gotten water in my engine area, and def not from surfing... u sure u got the rear drain plug nice and tight? Doesnt make sense to me that water would be coming in thru ur exhaust vents?!

Ideally id like to get a surf gate on this boat. Hate the fact that our rear transom is curved in two directions. i dont know how to get a surf gate hinge properly secured to a surface that curves in 2 directions without doing some custom fiberglass work (and even then worried about strength of hull). That said i plan to try and design something to mount to the teakwood. Figure some sort of metal bracket welded up that mounts to the bottom of teakwood and extends out horizontally and turns down to where we'd want the hinge to be. There would prob have to be added supports welded in, but it could work. If i could get it to work out i would mount the lenco to underside of my teak as well, but if needed im willing to mount that to the hull. With MArchers controls this could be a dope setup. And i like the thought of not touching the hull for thile hinge setup at all for resale purposes. I could run the wiring up the back transom zip tied to the eyelets and into the ski locker to wrap the whole thing up. Its what id call the "conservative approach". My intent is to get a surf gate on the port side mastered (im goofy) then work up a starboard gate for my cuz (regular footed). I intend to fab a ghetto version of this mount up over the weekend with scrap wood just to give u a better idea of what the heck im talking about. I have to figure out how im gonna get my hands on a legit welder to make this happen yet, so it might be a winter project (been saying that for 2 years now)

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the blower vents on the back corners. my water line is right at that level when moving.

Oh man u have that back end slammed! if u look at my post above ull see i have weight in my front and middle areas to even the boat out, which is typ what i do when i wakeboard... is the water always that high or just when ur starting off before u plane out? In telling u this ACME 911 prop we got was huge a come up, boat planes out super quick with 2500+ ballast. Hmm maybe ill try less weight in front and see if i can get more push from our wave

Ill take some video of my bag setup and everything this weekend for u. Lets dial this RLXI in like a boss for surfing!

Edited by rebelinc
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yea we are slammed. but I only run at 2450rpms surfing and 2700rpms wakeboarding. and it has no trouble with getting up and on plane. Im not sure what prop is on tho. been same prop for 12 years. here is another vid of yesterday.

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Looks like u got it dialed in pretty good. What wake surfer u riding? Are u chsnging the rpm on ur perfwct pass? I dont understand what u meant about the rpms...

I was hating on my boat, just cant seem to get it setup to surf good again. Built new gates and everything, way bummed. I have to rip my gopro photos for my older gate that seemed to work, but u prob dont want advice from me on how to setup the RLXI.

going to focus on wake skate and wakeboarding. Surfing is too much work on my little lake and my boat blows

Edited by rebelinc
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I use perfect pass and have it set on rpms. I like this better. i can get the speed dialed in down to the tenth. For a board, I am using an inland surfer. i forget what model but surfer style not a skim.

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