Boat Racer's Glossary of Terms

[GrandpaRacer]

'Dead mans' throttle.
'Kill switch'
Twist, a boat with warp in it to help with left turns.
Cleaver, straight rear edge prop.
Round ear and tulip, prop blade shapes.

[ryanbrew57s]

Hydrobout- Flat turning runabout

[DeanFHobart]

Punch.... Term for acceleration.

[Smitty]

Here's a term that a new guy should know: "Full butterfly"

Any ordinary production outboard motor needs to be able to idle and troll at very low rpm. To do this the butterfly valve in the carburetor throat, usually an oval-shaped disc of sheet brass, usually has a couple of small notches or holes in it to pass enough air to let the engine keep running slowly when the throttle is closed. But an engine that continues to run when the operator has let go of the throttle is a very bad feature in a raceboat. If the driver is thrown from the boat, he wants that engine to quit immediately upon losing his grasp of the deadman throttle (see above), and not to have the running engine either suck in water (if the boat is up-side down) or come idling back over him (if the boat is still upright).

To avoid this, racing engines have two systems, both of which should shut down the engine quickly, one being an automatically-switched method of shutting off the ignition system. The other engine-stopper is the "full butterfly," a replacement valve in the carburetor, maybe fabricated by the owner out of sheet brass or aluminum, which has no notches or holes and completely closes the carburetor throat. You want both the full butterfly and the automatic ignition switch as back-ups for each other.

I'm stating this at length because I know that among the visitors to this site there are owners of old hydros and such who just run around the lake with some sort of non-racing production outboard for power. You guys can fall out of the boat, too. How would you feel if you sent your pal or your kid out in your boat, and he tripped over a cruiser wake, fell out of the boat, and got chopped by the prop when your boat idled over him?

[tim king]

Here's a few . I know there dumb. However maybe not everyone knows.
On plane = When your boat starts to hydroplane.
Chine walking= Is a violent, often rapid, side to side oscillation. Technically, it is literally bouncing from one chine to the other. True chinewalk is one of the most dangerous events that a boater can experience. Any padV hull can chinewalk if there are hull problems, setup is wrong or the driver is inexperienced. PS I coped that.
Went on his head.= Crashed.
Driving over his head= Driving out of control.
Porpoising=The bow of the boat continually rises and falls
Blow it up=gas tank on alky engine
I know I'm going to catch hell for at least one of these.