'86 Ski Nautique 2001 Surf Gate

got one built for both sides now...   we are using a 48" hyperlite

From what we've discovered a bigger board makes a huge difference when it comes to surfing smaller wakes like ours, last year we bought a ronix cortez 4'8" and neither my wife or I could go without the rope, we picked up a bigger board - 5'6" and we could both ride without any trouble. I'm a pretty big tall dude at about 225 lbs we can ride ropeless with under 1700 lbs - ballast and people included

SNobsessed wrote: I'll try making a gate to see if it helps.

Chris, I was thinking the same thing. As I've read this thread I was never thinking of making one myself, but with the success of some of these rigs I might try it out, would be nice to not have to add the 2,000 lbs.!

Betcha #1's daily driver is a low rider. ....

And they all seem so casual about it.

Have you guys seen Thaddeus' new video on youtube? This looks like the best design I've seen yet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWjWO1-zBjo

Cool thread.... Surfing isn't exactly my thing but my knees and femoral nail want me to consider it. I've been watching a lot of these old school boat with surf gate threads. Keep up the good work.

Got the adjustable aluminum surf gate made and assembled. Gonna try to get it tested this weekend. She's just tossed together right now... gotta get stuff tightened up but had to make a video.

This is what she looks like

Pretty much anyone that is boarding or surfing a boat not originally made for ballast is exceeding the USCG rating. My 21' Sport has I think a 1,250 lb. rating, and when we wakeboard we put a pair of 400# bags on either side of the doghouse. That 800, plus a driver and spotter and misc. gear puts us right at or over the limit. Add any additional weight as many boarders, and all surfers, do, or another person or two, and you're going to be well over. Just a fact of life if you make your boat work for the sport rather than go buy a purpose built boat.

Last season was my first time owning a boat... And I just got this one in April... Just learning...   I will get different rope next trip.   I don't have a ski locker and not much weight up front thinking I need more.

Holy &$#@, well over 2,000 lbs. but what really surprises me is how much you have in the stern half of the boat, nearly all your weight there. I don't know much about weighting boats for surfing, but seems like when I've seen that much weight in a boat there's a few hundred in the ski locker and maybe 300 in the bow. I'm really surprised you don't sink a gunwale.

Just wanted to add, I'm not criticizing, just commenting!

Motorhead, what have you been running for ballast?

I have built 5 or 6 now...   every time I change the size or angle or whatever...   Had a killer wake today!   my plywood is 13 inches by 29 inches.   i put about 5 degrees turned out and the upright is sitting at about 75 degrees

The big turning point of my wake was going from straight up and down (90 degree angle) to turning it out to 75 ish...   gonna try a longer piece of plywood later this week... and want to try turning out the angle even more... but right now this is a real fun wave!

Hi, brand new poster but have been following tons of topics on here since I picked up my '89 nautique 2001 a few years back, especially this one. I made up a pretty simple gate with things I had around the shop and it works like a charm, in fact I'm almost amazed with how effective it is even without trying much fine tuning. My gate mounts with two clamps but both tucked away almost under the rub rail near the transom, I felt completely safe with the clamps positioned as they were, but I will trim down the clamp posts so they don't stick up so high and maybe fit something over top to ensure there are no jabby metal bits to snag my anything on.
The gate is 24" long, 9" tall and matches the angle of the boat hull at about 8 degrees off of straight vertical. I used another plastic piece that is 9" by 14" in a T to clamp the gate to the swim platform, it is mounted 5 1/2" inches up from the bottom of the gate piece to match the hull at the side of the boat. I used a piece of pressure treated lumber ripped at the 8 degree angle to mount the two together and to be sure it floats (which it does) so it doesn't drop to the bottom of the lake while I'm switching sides (which takes about 20 seconds)   The material I used is 5/8" thick and is similar to cutting board material (HDPE) and was plenty stiff enough.
I ran with two 350# sacs on either side of the doghouse, a 550# in front of the back seat and a 225# sac in the bow, a 130# driver and a 150# passenger on the rear seat of the side of the surfer and the wave was completely surfable for my 230# self on an inland surfer red rocket (pretty big board). I found the wave best at a pretty slow 9 mph for the starboard (goofy foot) side and that an increase to 10.5 made the port (regular foot) side clean enough for my 150# buddy to ride on a ronix cortez 5'4" board.
The boat was obviously over marked capacity but felt completely safe, especially compared to the lean we used to put on it to get a wave we couldn't surf ropeless with. We generally only surf on days there is no flat water to be had on the lake (drag lake) and this makes a great option without any significant investment to have a bit of fun mid afternoon when the water isn't great..
will have pics up soon...

TX Foilhead wrote: Can't we all just get some foils.

any further dev on this, did you get a good working option?