2005 puma/225 opti set up

This is an experimenters nightmare. Props vary in pitch, diameter, cup, rake, blade thickness, number of blades, to name just 6 points of interest. 1. More diameter means less slippage. But more drag on the blades. You want to turn the smallest diameter prop you can get away with while maintaining an accceptable slip rate. Smaller diameter reduces parasitic loss of bade friction against the water. 2. more pitch means more distance traveled per revolution, which directly influences the horsepower required to turn the prop, sort of like shifting gears in a car or bike. Taller gear (more pitch) means more effort per revolution required, but then you cover more ground per revolution and go faster so long as you dont start to bog the motor down to the point that it cant reach its maximum torque band to spin the prop. A motor might be capable of spinning a 30″ pitch prop, once the motor reaches 6K RPM, but most motors will never be able to spin the prop through the lower RPM band to get to that max torque band. Hole shot goes to heck and top speed will be way off. 3. Cupping is a pseudo-pitch increase, that seems to help “gripping” when turning, accelerating, running at high trim angles, etc. Ideally you would not want any cupping because it adds turbulence at the trailing edge of the prop, which again is a parasitic drain on forward thrust produced. 4. thinner blades are more efficient, but less rugged. They also tend to flex more, and then you get cracks or slung blades. I used to run a small-eared chopper with hand-thinned blades on my current boat, and it would absolutely fly. But the props would last a season or two at most and then it was trash time due to the stress cracks that could not be repaired. So we go with blades as thin as practical, but thick enough to reduce flexing to an acceptable level so that we dont have to resort to disposable props every year. That leaves a lot of room for experimentation. the most efficient prop known to man has just one blade. But the vibration and side-loads on the lower unit are horrible because 1/2 the time the single blade is out of the water. So for surfacing props, 2 blades are better. But they also produce significant vibration and side-loads because at times 1 blade is out of the water, at times one is just leaving the water as the other is impacting it, etc. 3 is usually the minimum used on real boats as this keeps one blade submerged at all times so that the vibration and bearing loads are managable. Going to 4 (or even 5 in the case of the merc high-5) simply reduces vibration more, and by having more blades, rough water doesnt cause them to ventilate/cavitate/slip as bad as a 3 blade prop will. So, name your poison. 3 blade is the fastest. But wait, the 3 blade props have larger diameter. So they also have more drag but less slip. But can you turn the 3-blade as fast? So many questions, and the only good way to answer them is to go to the lake with a truck-full of props and try them all. BCB seems to have almost done this already, although their recommendations are more of a “one-size fits most” which is the best way to prop a boat for the general user. Can you improve on what they recommend? Probably. Will you have to make some trade-offs? Yep. I love choppers. But they have a slow hole-shot. I dont care about that, I care about the extra top-end you get when one is set up properly. But then I like to experiment. One could probably make a full-time job of helping people find the “optimal prop” for their specific boat. And one would catch a lot of grief when the owner calls and says “OK, I ran 83 with my whiz-bang chopper by myself… but today I went fishing with big bubba, and it almost wouldnt get up on plane, and top speed was off by 10+ MPH. I normally cruise at 50 at about 4K RPM, but today I was doing 45 at 5K. Whats wrong with this sucky prop?” That is the problem with “optimal”. It is optimal for a given set of conditions, but not for all general conditions. Thats where the Trophy comes in. More blades, smaller diameter, better general-purpose prop to work year-round… Dont get me wrong, Im a big tempest+ fan. And if you dont mind steering torque (I dont) you can run em pretty high to get less wetted surface and probably outrun the trophy by some small margin. But if the water roughens up, slip is going way up or you are going to have to bury the prop deeper which increases drag, while the trophy will run just fine where it was previously jacked… Prop guys speed _HOURS_ tweaking these things. Fishermen want to spend hours _fishing_ instead. I sort of enjoy both. I like to blow by everyone on the river, then go catch some fish as well… 2008 Pantera Classic2014 Mercury Pro XS 200

After many test runs in the last 3 years. You just dont know until you try. The info provided will get you close!!