Here's the skinny after a beautiful week at lake Havasu:
The v-drive Epics are tail heavy. That is to say, they're rigged out of trim in an overly nose-up attitude.
The EVIDENCE is 1) swim steps aren't normally awash at rest, 2) nose-up and -down oscillations at various speeds identical to over-trimming an outdrive.
The IMPACT is 1) said oscillations, 2) high planing speed, 3) the hull does not handle chop and rollers as well as it could.
The FIX is to 1) put extra weight in the nose or 2) install trim tabs (either fixed, adjustable or electrically actuated.)
On one trip down to the south end of the lake, when the traffic and rollers were insignificant and the surface smooth, I spent some time observing the difference between sitting in the aft seat, abeam the helm and then in the bow. The oscillations were clearly evident except when sitting all the way forward. I'm only 150 lbs, but my moment was enough to squelch the bounce. That trip made it perfectly clear that the situation is exactly the same as an over-trimmed IO except that we don't suffer from the typical loss of traction an IO's prop will undergo when over-trimmed. If a boat is in calm water at a steady speed and still bounces, it's out of trim.
Seems the very coolest way to kill a few birds is to put a good set of trim tabs along the transom, with electric trim, adjustable from the helm. The easy way to accomplish this would be to use the readily-available rigs out there like they install on the offshore boats. The cooler way would be to rig it like the old v-drive, flatbottom hotboats used to do - from chine to chine.
By making the 'flap' extend across the entire width of the running surface, we'd get better bite for a given deflection which equates to using smaller deflections. This approach would also reduce the risk of screwing up the wake by introducing additional corners back there. However, the speedo pickup is in the way and the exhaust extends down low. Don't have a great workaround for those wrinkles yet.
I'm also hoping that having the trim adjustable from the bow will give a little control when transitioning from slalom to kneeboard speed and from rough water to glass. Imagine that - a towboat with some pitch control (in a more efficient way then TAPS or other stuff dangling only in the propwash.)
The good news is that the out-of-trim is in the right direction: if it were overly nose-down, trim tabs wouldn't help and we'd be stuck with using ballast.
As far as the swim platform goes, I love it wet. Our buddy's new Centurion is about six inches above the water and the little ones need a friggin ladder to get up there.
