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Surface drive motors?

16K views 29 replies 16 participants last post by  Grice 
I have been looking at these too. Only 2 that have reverse are Gatortail and Prodrive. Gatortail reverse works like an outboard reverse where the prop spins in an opposite direction. Prodrive reverse is different in that the skeg actually rotates 180 degrees so the prop is always spinning the same way. With the Prodrive they have manual reverse which is standard and hydro reverse which is a 1500 option. These motors are expensive the 35 hp tiller versions for both brands run about 7K with reverse. Mud Buddy is cheaper but its because they don't have reverse. Gatortail is belt driven and Prodrive is shaft driven. GT will be a little faster since it is belt driven. You can mod these motors because they are just large lawn mower engines. When you mod them you lose reliabilty. People have trouble with oil leaks and stuff from blowing head gaskets and the case gasket will start to leak because the compression is higher when you mod it. Buddy had a 35 hp modded that was estimated at over 70 hp and he blew a head gasket quite often. He told me not to get a modded motor and just stick with stock because you won't have as much trouble with it. The boat does matter a lot. These motors are designed to run on boats that are completly flat on the bottom. They run like crap on a mod V boat. They will run ok on a flat jon but they run best on a mud boat. Flat jons usually have ribs in the bottom and the mud boats are completly smooth on the bottom and they are made much better and are at least .125" thick in the hull. Also a longer boat runs better with these motors. A 1848 should run faster than a 1648 with the same motor. Not sure why that is but ask any of the people who make these boat/motors and they will tell you the same. Both prodrive and GT make boats and motors. A new rig with a 35 hp will be at least 15K so that is a con. From what I've seen a 35 mud motor rig runs about like a 25 outboard as far as speed. I mean there going to run in mid 20's with a load and maybe close to 30 mph unloaded. But the difference is they will run that speed in shallow water where an outboard will be slow.
 
the excel f4 shallow water is a nice boat but i think it is heavier than a similar prodrive boat. I'm not sure because pd doesn't post their boat weights, but an excel boat has floatation, full floor, and multiple boxes. A typical pd boat won't have any floatation, a partial floor, 1 drivers box, and maybe a gun box. Also some think u shouldn't put a pd motor on a "hunt deck" or step down type transom which the excel f4s have the hunt deck transom. On the other hand a gatortail motor is thought to be better on a hunt deck because of the way the reverse works it keeps the boat cleaner.
 
All the ones I know with power tilt/trim kick up easy. The motors are made to kick up if they hit something. It's not like an outboard with tilt/trim. Only 2 brands have reverse prodrive and gatortail. The prodrive works like described above but the gatortail works like an outboard where the prop spins in the opposite direction. It's best to have a hunt deck type boat if you have a gatortail to keep from getting the boat wet. If you had a gatortail on a regular transom you could get water in the boat if you gave it a lot of gas running in reverse. With a hunt deck on the back of the boat it takes care of that problem. You trim the motor down so the prop is under water when using reverse but it still moves alot of water toward the boat.
 
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