MOBILEMERCMAN

I have raced, Velocitys and Fountains. The 22 and 30 Velocity as well as the 38 Fountain Fever are on my list of favorite boats.

There are others too.

Pat McPherson

My best boating bud has a 1997 29' Fountain. The bottom of that boat has all kinds of stuff going on. Variable dead rise V, step, pad, and notch.
I will say the boat is vary fast with modest power for its size. She ran 65+ with a 415HP/502MagMPI and now runs 75 with a juiced (better heads, stock cam) 525SC. My boat runs 67-68 with the same 415HP/502 Mag that was originally in the Fountain. The 29' Fountain is a dog out of the hole compared to my Velocity and does not seem to corner quite as nice. I haven't run my boat in the rough enough to compare that aspect yet.

wolfeguitars

No......, Stepp & Reggie both enjoyed Allison Craft pleasure & race hulls for years before Stepp decided to adapt Darris Allison's designs to larger craft, flip his Mirage & reconfigure the bottom to Allison's design, with input from Darris hissef. Fountain followed approx. 3-4 years later and his 1'st boats looked almost exactly like blown up Allison 20's - beak, pad, step back et al, which amazing boat I was tooling around in at the time. Darris is the Genius of hull design of all times. Visit his site & learn my brothas. He has more speed records than "all" other boat makers combined, and then some.
I've been priviledged to spend time with him in his design shop & pick his massive brain a tad. I learned more from him about prop cupping, skeg shape, pad shingleing, x-dimension, bottom grain (NEVER wax the bottom) and other (then) useful stuff. Stepp learned at his feet also, but Allison never had much use for Fountain at that time.
Besides this jazz, Allison invented the Bass Boat, Speedmaster lowers (yes he did), Lifter props, nose cones, and a muriad of things we all have benefited from. If you're ever near Knoxville- visit him & you'll be amazed. His claim that his boats will carry others boats on their deck & go faster than they'll go on their own bottom, has been proven & is "true."
I bow to the master of aquatic speed & "efficiency" in little ole Maryville, TN.

RaggedEdge

I agree on all here, back when I was running a string of one Hydrostream after another I always wanted an Allison. Nothing on the water runs like one, 100+ sitting on an inch or two of hull, gotta love it.

P.S. You should put a ! after the NO.

wolfeguitars

P.S. You should put a ! after the NO. [/QUOTE]

I should've explained that I'm not aware of Fountain nor Stepp "claiming" to have invented this stuff, but I always thought it was rather poor taste to NOT give Allison any credit for his & his Dad's (Paul Allison) creations. Allison moved V bottom performance out of the dark ages, those offshore guys have benefited & it would've been "classy" to at least say where they got it. BTW- Allison has a section on his site listing 100 "Firsts".......click on the specific feature for a short note about pads, notches, prop cupping, etc. It's really interesting. Also, his race boat page shows some hulls literally "leaping" into the air from a standing start & some of his latest bottom details are shown, in case Reg. & Stepp need some more.......uh..............um.............er...... .... "ideas."
Allison used beaks to race 18 fotters in the 20 ft. class, Reg. used it to sell people a 30' boat & have them think they bought a 32' boat.
FYI- When we designed the 22' Vel. we wanted a long bottom for better rough water ability, as this was a deficiency with the 30. Result was that the 22 had the same bottom length as a 35' Cig. Little trivia fer ya. Course- the 35' Cig. was a rocker bottom & not much of a rough water boat & they quickly made a 36' & 38' that corrected that. I could go on, but, really...........who cares?
Oh- 1 more to credit Allison's designs- 18' Donzi with 260 Mercruiser = 56mph......22" Vel. with same package = 68mph. Much larger boat, etc.

Velocity Vector

I beleive Steve S. invented the 3/4 to 1/2 pad when he made the 320 from the 41 mold. Can you beleive I have been on here one year now and haven't pissed anyone off yet?

1HYPER1

Yet HEE HEE HEE

Sick Stinger

Hey VV cant say the same for my self in that catogory.
-Mike

RaggedEdge

I think you're a little optimistic on the 3/4 - 1/2 pad deal. You need to remember good old Steve left 9' feet of bottom sitting in the mold unused, and it was the part that the F'er was designed to run on. I'd go for the 5% pad bottom design if I were you, should be pretty much spot on. Based on real measurements the 26/280 has more bottom to run on than the 32/320, truth here, we measured both boats. Boy did I feel cheated that day.

Wish I could say the same, on the pizzin' off deal, seems I have an innate ability in that department. Oh well, I just call it as I see it, F'em if they don't like to hear it. Damn, there I go again.

While I'm at it..................Hey Sick, have you got it figured out yet that your boy Steve Stepp didn't invent the pad bottom? How 'bout a big NO!!! on that one, exclamation points just for you. You could have just PM'd me the question, I would have told you he snatched it from Allison, like others in the industry, and saved you the embarrasement of asking. I'm not really a bad guy, just ask my good buddy VV.



In an attempt to be polite to my buddy here................ Hey VV, How is the project comming along? The parts list is pretty impressive. Hope you're on the water soon. Best Regards, Ragged

Velocity Vector

I think with more power that 5% pad gets bigger the faster you go, that's how it worked in my "dream" the other night. Besides who needs a pad or steps when all you got in the water is props? "Well", I know, "Such a deep subject for such a shallow mind"! I have been off a couple day's now just got off a 32 day job. It's good to be home and wash those socks. The engines are being prepped for dyno runs. I had to change all the merc ignition to MSD because of the limited room in back and wire all that up. Throttle linkage, relocated the oil filter from the back. Should have some dyno numbers soon. As far as you two, if "I paid you" , you couldn't stay out of trouble!