Back to the main site

Proper prop

Oh sure Link, you can joke around about it now, but when it happens, he'll be the first guy you call.!!!! Haha
 
Yes, good info. Now let's study it.

Bowen's test props average slip percentages in the teens to low 20's, with a high of 30% and a low of 7%. Quite normal with blade variations.

We have two similar model boats that tested the same basic two props in 13-15p with completely different results in speed and slip percentages.

Over 40% slip?????

Houston..................... we have a problem.

Refer to post #9.

There is no magic stainless prop that will solve his issue.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I've noticed nearly all of the responses have been  yammi's or merc engines, does anyone have a report on the 22 ft benni with a 115 Honda engine ?? :)
 
I have a 2010 24 SFI.  Yamaha 115. Bought it used with 28hrs on motor, came with a three blade, aluminum, standard prop. No mickey mouse ears for blades.. it was swinging a 14x17.   Got 22-23 miles per hour with four adults, fishing gear, ice , livewells full etc.  Throttle would hit 5400.  Swithced to a Yamaha Stainless Steel prop designed for pontoons, Mickey Mouse 3 blade.  14X15. I expected higher RPM's.. no go.  It dropped the RPM's to 4700 WOT but still hitting around 22-23 mph.. same load.   Tried a 3rd prop.  Mercury QuickSilver Nemesis 14X13.   Hitting 5600 RPM,  25-27 MPH same load.  This prop bites good. Takes off well from a sit still and has increased my top speed..   Give it a try.
 
v1rot8 said:
I think I have some information that may help you with your search for the proper prop. My boat is nearly identical to yours. I have a 22 SLMX with a Yamaha F115 four stroke. The pontoons are 25" diameter with no lifting strakes. I drove myself crazy about 2 months ago dealing with the same issues you are having with your propeller. My dealer set my boat up with the 13pitch Yamaha propeller when I picked it up also. In fact, Bennington provides the dealers with a chart that gives propeller recomendations based on motor and pontoon. For a 22' pontoon with the F115 engine they recommend two different propellers. The first being the aluminum 13 pitch you started with and the second being a Yamaha Stainless Steel 14" x 13 pitch (MAR-PNTN3-V4-13).

My boat also hit the rev limiter (6250 RPM) and was ventilating when I first ran the boat. My top speed on the GPS was 27MPH with this prop. When I brought the boat back to the dealer and discussed the issue with him he installed the 14" x 13 Yamaha prop mentioned above and told me to try it. I have had lots of issues with my dealer and feel that he is always trying to make a quick dollar rather than having my best interest in mind. Needless to say when he put the stainless prop on I thought it was just a way to get another $400 out of me. Reluctantly I dicided to give it a try. If you read this forum and many others the value of a Stainless Steel propeller is ofen debated especially on a 115hp engine. I will leave you to read about the pros and cons of stainless but the performance spoke for itself. With the 14" x 13p stainless the boat ran at 6000 RPMs and on the GPS the top speed was between 31 and 32 MPH. I was pleased with the holeshot and the top end speed.

*****By the way the boat was loaded with a full tank of gas and my son and myself with a collective weight of 300 pounds. Weather conditions were roughly 60-70 degrees for all of the props. and winds pretty much calm. *****

Not beleving that I needed a stainless prop on a pontoon I set out to find an aluminum propeller that would perform as well.....I went to a local prop shop and he was nice enough to fill the back of my truck with a bunch of new props. He let me try them and bring back the ones that I did not want. I tried several brands and sizes.

Here are my test results:

1) Yamaha 13 pitch 6250rpm on rev limiter 25-26MPH (aluminum)

2) Yamaha 13.5 x 15 pitch (6E5-45947-00-00) 5400 rpm 26-27 MPH (aluminum)

3) Mercury Black Diamond (QA2034x) 13.75" x 15 5200 RPM 26-27MPH (aluminum)

4) Mercury Black Diamond (QA2032X) 14" x 13p 5900RPM 28-29MPH (aluminum) ***** BEST PERFORMING ALUMINUM PROP I FOUND AND IS NOW MY SPARE****

5) Mercury Black Diamond (QA2832X) 14" x 13p "Pontoon Extra Cup" 5100 - 5200RPM 25-26MPH (aluminum)

6) Yamaha Stainless Steel (MAR-PNTN3-V4-13) 14" x 13p Pontoon 6000RPM 31-32MPH *****BEST OVERALL PERFORMANCE****

****By the way the Mercury Props require you to buy a Flo-Torque hub kit (835271Q2) it cost me about $50****

In the end I decided to keep the Yamaha Stainless Steel 14" x 13 pitch (MAR-PNTN3-V4-13) on the boat a my main prop. If you search for the Yamaha Performance Bulletin PB-BNT-24SLi-F115TLR-2010-10-13-PNT you will find this propeller is tested on a 24' Bennington SLi. Given the fact that my top speed and RPM data is nearly identical and it is one of the two props Bennington recommends for our combination of boat and motor I think it would be worth giving a try. I agree with the others that a 17 pitch sounds way too high for your boat. I hope that you find this information helpful....Before buying my boat I thought that the dealer would just set the boat up with the proper combination and I would be all set....What I found was that it takes a whole lot of trial and error to find the right combination. As you can tell by the responses on this forum everyone has different combinations that work well for them.
Click to expand...
Great post.  I bought my toon with a 115 Yamaha with a stainless prop already on it.  How can I tell if it is the MAR-PNTN3-V4-13?  There is a H14 on the outside of the prop.
 
Good resurrection post sock-feet
 
Ah yes the good ol days of prop discussions. Ha ha.

Glad I'm dialed in and done with that!
 
Kaydano, Have to admit I am a little surprised that the stainless prop added 5mph over the 13.5 X 15 aluminum that I currently have on my 2275RL.  I see the SS is 14 x 13 and I have always suspected that I was not reaching my RPM's high enough.  I think my WOT only reaches 5600 or 5800, I may have to revisit this in the spring
 
Sock-feet,

There should be stamped numbers on the hub of the prop, including size, pitch and part number. Take a close look all the way around the hub, as they are not always all in one spot.

We sure have had a lot of old posts being revisited lately, but that just goes to show what a wealth of information there is here!
 
Shows the search tool works also.
 
Link said:
Kaydano, Have to admit I am a little surprised that the stainless prop added 5mph over the 13.5 X 15 aluminum that I currently have on my 2275RL. I see the SS is 14 x 13 and I have always suspected that I was not reaching my RPM's high enough. I think my WOT only reaches 5600 or 5800, I may have to revisit this in the spring
Click to expand...
I have a hard time believing it was the stainless that made that kind of difference. More likely it was one or more of a number of design attributes that made the difference, not the metal.Stainless is also very HEAVY compared to aluminum. In the 100 HP range and below, I have a hard time believing stainless is any better. Maybe less flex, but definitely more weight. At low HP, a stainless would perform worse, I would think, due to added weight.

You'd have to test two IDENTICAL props to determine the actual difference in metals at a given HP. Far as I know, no such twin props exist.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I have an aluminum prop (mercury) that came with the boat, 15 1/2 x 15, and a spare (solas) that is stainless steel with extra cup, they perform at identical numbers speed, rpm. I was hoping for a slight increase in speed, but that didn't happen !
 
You've got too much pitch for a 115. RPM's should be up around 6000 @ WOT.  I would try a 13p.
 
that's what I been tellin these guys down here but they say go with what I got !!
 
v1rot8 said:
Here are my test results:


1) Yamaha 13 pitch 6250rpm on rev limiter 25-26MPH (aluminum)


2) Yamaha 13.5 x 15 pitch (6E5-45947-00-00) 5400 rpm 26-27 MPH (aluminum)


3) Mercury Black Diamond (QA2034x) 13.75" x 15 5200 RPM 26-27MPH (aluminum)


4) Mercury Black Diamond (QA2032X) 14" x 13p 5900RPM 28-29MPH (aluminum) ***** BEST PERFORMING ALUMINUM PROP I FOUND AND IS NOW MY SPARE****


5) Mercury Black Diamond (QA2832X) 14" x 13p "Pontoon Extra Cup" 5100 - 5200RPM 25-26MPH (aluminum)


6) Yamaha Stainless Steel (MAR-PNTN3-V4-13) 14" x 13p Pontoon 6000RPM 31-32MPH *****BEST OVERALL PERFORMANCE****


****By the way the Mercury Props require you to buy a Flo-Torque hub kit (835271Q2) it cost me about $50***
Click to expand...

First time post to the Bennington Forum or any forum for that matter. I just wanted to say the post from v1rot8 was extremely helpful. I have a 225SL Bennington 2010 with 115hp Yamaha. I just bought it last fall. It came with two aluminum props. One prop was a 13 5/8 X 14 Yamaha propeller and the other was 13 5/8 X 13 Yamaha propeller. With my 14 inch pitch I could run 5300 RPM WOT at 27 mph down stream. My 13 in pitch would hit the rev limiter, ventilate and would only run 23 mph down stream. I just bought the Mercury  QA2032X with Flo-Torque hub kit and installed it yesterday. The boat ran 5900 RPMs and 30 MPH down stream. With out this post I would still be struggling finding the correct propeller. It is amazing how the dealer does not know how to fix this issue and it is what they do for a living. I would assume lots of other people have run into this issue as well. Thanks again v1rot8 for your post. It really saved me time, money and effort. 
 
After reading all these post it looks like the merc qa2032x is best for a prop. I just ordered it from Iboats.com for $119.50 with the correct hub kit included and free shipping. My boat is a gl2250 with 2 25" tubes and a Yamaha F115 top speed is 26-27 mph with a solas 13.5 X 15 pitch @ 5300 rpms . I will post my results in a couple of weeks.
 
Update test results with a merc QA 2032X (14 X 13 ) prop best tops speed was 28.3 @ 5900 rpms looks like the prop change neted me 1.5 to 2 mph increase. Now that I have got my rpms up closer to the upper limits i suspect this prop will be much better when i have 4 to 6 people and gear in the boat. All Test was done a full tank of fuel and 2 adults and top closed up.
 
I probably have a stupid question, or 2, but here goes anyway. All this talk on different threads about finding the proper prop for each different boat and motor makes me dizzy! 15 vs 17 pitch? What diameter? Mounting height? SS vs aluminum? And so on! Shouldn't the boat builder or dealer already know what prop is best for each boat/motor combination?

Also, I have an I/O with SS duo prop, and couldn't tell you the size or pitch (don't even know what pitch is?). And that is if there is even a pitch on a duo prop. Is finding the proper prop (say that 3 times fast;) ) as critical for an IO as it is for an outboard? My last boat was a deck boat with an IO Alpha 1 and we had the same SS single prop for all 20 years we had the boat, and it looked as good when I sold it as it did when I bought it. Not a knick on it. It always seemed to run just fine. Was I just lucky, or am I just stupid, or a bit of both?

Can someone please explain all this to me ,and teach an old dog something?
 
You are right. Prop selection is NOT easy.

In addition to what you mentioned (pitch, blade count, diameter, metal, etc), it also depends how you use your boat! If you want top speed, there's a prop for that. If you want max acceleration, there's a DIFFERENT prop for that, even though your boat and motor are the same in either case. If you want best fuel economy, there's yet ANOTHER prop for that. Probably another one if you plan to run a heavy boat full of people vs just you and the dog. Or cat. Cat only goes out once though. Doesn't get to come back.

Just saying that's why the dealer can't pick the best single prop for a given boat/motor combination, because that same boat/motor combo can have several different "best" props, each depending on how the buyer will use the boat (which the dealer probably doesn't know especially if the first time boat-owner customer doesn't yet know himself).

Fortunately, it isn't too hard to get CLOSE. You could spend your entire life looking at props.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top