k9medic
Senior Member
We headed out Saturday morning for a trial "tender tow" run of about 70nm which ultimately ended up with us at the shipyard in Tarpon Springs for some scheduled maintenance.
The tender is a 16' Wahoo (Whaler clone) powered by a brand new 90hp Suzuki. The tow setup I have discussed here before but it amounts to 5/8" double braided nylon line connected to 10mm dyneema.
The plan was to run at about 8kts and the boat did great the entire time. I have tested this tow set up for short distances as 17-18kts. too.
Having the tender with us really came in handy as a friend of mine that was following us down had engine troubles on one engine. He was already travelling slower than us thanks to his copious amounts of barnacles so we were about 10nm ahead of him when he had the issue.
I unhooked the tender to go help my friend and left my 13 year old in charge of the big boat with instructions to continue south and that I would catch up.
By the time we got my friends boat back moving, my own boat was almost 15nm away! It was a short trip though at the speeds that the Wahoo can run.
Before anybody gets too excited, my 13 year old has had a Florida boaters license since he was 10 and has been running the big boat (to include docking) for 2 years. He's more capable than many of the the "captains" on the water today.
Overall the trip was great and we stopped in Turtle Cove marina for the final night for the planned bottom job the next morning.
The worst thing that happened was on when trailering the tender back home. I lost an axle bearing and had to McGyver some things to replace it.
The tender is a 16' Wahoo (Whaler clone) powered by a brand new 90hp Suzuki. The tow setup I have discussed here before but it amounts to 5/8" double braided nylon line connected to 10mm dyneema.
The plan was to run at about 8kts and the boat did great the entire time. I have tested this tow set up for short distances as 17-18kts. too.
Having the tender with us really came in handy as a friend of mine that was following us down had engine troubles on one engine. He was already travelling slower than us thanks to his copious amounts of barnacles so we were about 10nm ahead of him when he had the issue.
I unhooked the tender to go help my friend and left my 13 year old in charge of the big boat with instructions to continue south and that I would catch up.
By the time we got my friends boat back moving, my own boat was almost 15nm away! It was a short trip though at the speeds that the Wahoo can run.
Before anybody gets too excited, my 13 year old has had a Florida boaters license since he was 10 and has been running the big boat (to include docking) for 2 years. He's more capable than many of the the "captains" on the water today.
Overall the trip was great and we stopped in Turtle Cove marina for the final night for the planned bottom job the next morning.
The worst thing that happened was on when trailering the tender back home. I lost an axle bearing and had to McGyver some things to replace it.