Can you wake surf on a ski boat?

like an Outback or the likes...

sure! I have a 2003 Outback and it produces a surfable wake using 1200 lbs ballast.

yeah. It's possible. Similar to saying is it possible to wakeboard behind an i/o or jet boat. It's very possible but it's not optimal. I used to surf behind my ski boat before I got the v drive. Make the best of what you got!

Tige 22i, before the funky lay out of the newer ones. It's actually a great surf hull. It produces a far better wake than than the two new 23ft. Malibu's (XTI and LSV), both with wedge and ballast, I've surfed. I can run one 500lb. sac in the trunk and with six people it will put out clean, long 2 1/2 footers with perfect transition all day long. With another 500lb'er and a few more peeps, it's fantastic, port or starboard. It's all in the hull man.

if you throw a little weight at it it will perform great.

2007 X 7 surfs good for my friends. Both sides and they get off the swim platform with no rope in their hands.

QUOTE:
By Nick (nickypoo) on Thursday, April 05, 2007 - 1:19 pm:

Tige 22i, before the funky lay out of the newer ones. It's actually a great surf hull. It produces a far better wake than than the two new 23ft. Malibu's (XTI and LSV), both with wedge and ballast, I've surfed. I can run one 500lb. sac in the trunk and with six people it will put out clean, long 2 1/2 footers with perfect transition all day long. With another 500lb'er and a few more peeps, it's fantastic, port or starboard. It's all in the hull man. [/QUOTE}

WHAT?!?!?!?!?! What are you smoking?! Here's a pic of a Malibu LSV 23:

How much extra weight do you have on top of the stock ballast?

Trust me, I would love to see that out of the two Bu's, but it just aint workin' out. Neither of these old farts will put any extra ballast in them. I've seen a lot of promising pictures (such as your's), but have had ZERO success with these two.

I could go for some smoke right about now.

First, I wish that was my boat!!! I have a 96 Sunsetter DD. We were at a Malibucrew event.

Thats a 06 LSV with about 8 people in it.
Thats stock ballast with 400lbs of pop bags and the power wedge at 3/4 down at 9.3 mph.

Here's my Bu. 96 Malibu Sunsetter direct drive with 4 people, 1 idoit, 880lbs ballast and a wedge.

Well, I was approved by the wife to spend up to $40K, but I am still limited to max of 22 feet of space and that is turned cross ways in the garage! It will literally be inches form the door.

Get the Malibu VTX. Its a 20 footer V drive!

get yourself a Moomba with a BoatMate fold away tongue trailer.

Where you located? May 12, 2007 will be the Florida Supra/Moomba jamboree and there will be a lot of wakesurfing going on behind several different Skiers Choice products.

There is also a Northwest Supra/Moomba Jamboree being planned for August.

Ahhhh yes, the power wedge. Both of these are rockin' the standard wedge. I think that might be part of the problem. What's funny is that they both bought new big bad Bu's because they had some antiquated old rides with no ballast or towers or nothin'. I've been out on the LSV a couple of times and all he wants to do is surf. The wake is maybe 1 1/2 to 2ft., but with horrible shape and direction. The wakeboarding wakes are flat out SICK but the surf wakes make me sick. That is until I get in my little old D-drive Tige and get back to some good times.

These old D-drives are more geared toward skiing with negative chines that stop about halfway back, spray relief pockets, flat bottoms and steeply angled sides, all of which help make a good surf wake. Look at a new Bu hull. The negative chines run all the way back, no spray relief pocks steep V's and nearly vertical sides. Here's a pic of my hull. Sorry I don't have any of the wake. I'll try to get some this weekend.

By the the way soup, nice lookin' wake from what I can tell.

Thanks nick! I'm still trying to dial it in actually... The Manual Wedge for wakesufing really doesn't help because of the angle of the boat. The pitch is so high that it does little.

I can almost bet a million that your friends bu's are the diamond hull malibus. They make two different hulls for the same model.

they are making ballast bags specially for direct drives for surfing

The 23 LSV's throw a HUGE surf wake when weighted properly. They are big boats and need lots of weight. If your friends (or you) are interested in getting their boats surf wakes bigger you should have them check out themalibucrew.com and do a search. It has been covered many times over there with some great results. I know that the option of choice for many LSV owners is to remove (in the older boat with above the floor tanks) the tanks and replace with 750lb. sacks. Or place 750's over the floor tanks.

Getting back to the OP's question. Yes you can definitly surf a DD, but as mentioned you need to add a significant amount of weight or VAB (people) to the boat. Just get a few sacks and play around with the configuration and you shouldn't have any problem.

I have an 05 Outback and it throws a nice surf wake. I run 1200lbs in the rear and 300 in the bow. We also usually have 5 to 7 people in the boat too.

I've told them to research it over there, they're just not the internet geek I am. They also don't tweek on there boats like I do mine. Wallys. Whatever. I have seen (in pics) some big bad wakes out of the LSV's, just never in person. Without the right amount they are pretty bad. But ya, big boat = need more ballast. Not rocket science.

Brandon-How much of that 880 do you have in the nose? I would think that the only way to keep the wedge at a reasonable angle of attack would be to keep the nose down with a considerable amount of weight.

I was looking at some of those D-Drive surf sacs. I'm sure they would work out pretty well. I just hate having loose sacs on the floor.

i was able to surf behind my 16 foot ski tique, with about 5 people in the boat and about 900 lbs in my fat seat

Any chance of getting at least a surfable wake out of my '92 21 ft Supra? Pic is in my profile.

I don't have any ballast bags, but i'm sure i can round up enough VAB or perhaps use a waterbed mattress just to try it out. The boat is rated for 8 people or 1400 pounds.

It looks awesome and i've though about trying it out this year. It hasn't exactly filtered down to Alabama just yet; i've never even seen it done or seen how a to properly sack a boat for surfing.

What say yall?

Thanx,
Dirty

You need ballast dirty, no questions about that.

Nick,
I have about 250 lbs up front of lead, a 440lb fat sack on the side of the motor and one behind the motor and the wedge down.

With all of that I STILL need a couple people on the left side of the boat to get a surfable wake

These are probably my two best surf pics, as far as how the wake was that day.

Spotter side


Driver side

I'm not sure I agree with Nick regarding the older boat chines. My boat is a V-drive but on an older ski hull, one that is no longer in production. I have chines from midship back, a hull extension in the back, and other ski boat hull features.

I think that some combination of hull extension, chine, and other ski boat features work against building a good surfing wake. The problem with my wake is that it gets funky features from the ski boat hull and the goofy wake never matches up to the regular side. On the positive side I think that it takes more weight to get a boat with a squared off hull to build a surf wake than one with a chine. The reason why is that he chine isn’t pushing the boat back against the ballast.

I rig for wakesurfing I run with over 2,000 pounds. I get a nice surf wake, best I’ve been on, but people keep calling 911 because they think we’re sinking. No really the helicopters came out and were hovering overhead, we had no idea why until we got back to the dock and found out what was going on.

I ran a wakesurf comp last year with a VLX, with an 800 pound sack, wedge up, and about 10 people the wake was pretty darn good on both sides. I also surfed in a comp behind an LSV, wedge down, 600 pound sack and about 10 people – worst wake I’ve ever surfed. That said I don’t think the wedge should have been down and I think the lake, or the part of the lake they were in was too shallow. Since the VLX was so good I’m inclined to think the LSV wasn’t set up very well.

We’re having a NWL wakesurf get together on Lake Norris at the Spring Dock Resort, on April 20-22. This get together is open to all. One guy is bringing either a 247 or and LSV. I’m really looking forward to riding one of these bigger bu’s, properly set up so I can see what the real deal is on bigger Malibu’s. I’ll have my boat there and there’ll be an X2.

2,0000 pounds regular side V-drive Ski hull



2,000 pounds goofy side


Rub rail in the water? He...he the Centurion letters are in the water

We had a Malibucrew get together last year and there was a guy (Grant) surfing his 247. These are the pic I dug up.

That's a really strong list, about what I do on my boat.

A couple of problems above. One the surfer is on his belly and has a higher exposure to CO. I assume there was no FAE or other CO mitigation device. Two, while the big guy is in a swing seat, I catch heck when I have someone hike out.

The wake looks short, I'd say there's too much weight in the back.

Crew of three and 2,080 pounds.


I built a rack to mount weights on the tower, we no longer hike out - Note we're riunning two boats side by side for a spine wake, the spine wake didn't really work out.

750 lbs on the bench another 750 in the locker. Another 500 lbs with the center tank and pop bags in the bow.


Look how far back the rider is from the back of the boat - now that's a surf wake