Water Depth

Rex

Rex

New Member
Apr 15, 2009
127
LA
Boat Info
Mine
Engines
Merc
At what water depth do you start getting worried it's too shallow?
 
When your boat stops moving like someone put on the brakes.:grin:

It all depends on your comfort factor. Your boat needs a tad over 3' with the drive down, less with it trimmed up some.

Make sure you know which way your depthfinder is set - from the keel or from the waterline. The manual will explain this.
 
It depends on several variables in my opinion. What is the bottom like? Sandy or rocks? Is it a familiar place? Where I used to keep my boat, the channel getting out to the bay was narrow and shallow. The bottom was soft silt that was relatively forgiving (except on impellers). If you started to drift out of the channel even a little bit, it got really shallow really quickly. There were times I didn't even like to look at the depth on my sounder. But in the two years I was there, regularly passing through this channel, I never ran aground. Sometimes it would read 2 - 3 feet during low tide or 4 - 5 in high tide. Never had problems. Now, that being said is it good for muddy/sandy water to be drawn through your engine for cooling. Not really.
 
It depends. (Grin)

On our local man made TVA lake when I'm in 20' of water I start to worry. You know you're about to run over the top of a mountain in the middle of 60+- water.

Running around in 5-10 feet of water in the bays around PCB just about drove me nuts.

If you get out of the Channel on parts of the TN river you can also have one of those fast brake stops people talk about.
 
when my depthfinder reads 3' I start to worry..it's been as low as 1 foot... My props are about 8" lower than where the depthfinder is located so at 1 ft... I'm very close to the bottom.. In our waters, most of the bottom is soft silt so it is indeed somewhat forgiving as far as the first inch or two. My advice is to learn to instinctively lift the drives when you know your props are hitting bottom.. this has saved my ass a few times.
 
For me it is certainly 5-6' deep. I see guys on Allatoona in much larger cabin cruisers taking the channel over to where they dredge out the Etowah River and it is silty bottom and I am too chicken to do it!
 
Heck, come to SW FL. We live in 4 ft of water around the inland waters on a good day. Even the ICW can dip to 6 ft or less (regardless of what the controlling depths say).:smt101

Like shoelessben says, "it depends on the situation". In my home turf around SW FL. I don't worry until I'm under 5'. Here in New England, anything less than 20' and I'm watching the charts, plotter and waters closely.
 
My Buggy draws a little less than 5 ft. I get watchful at 8 ft. (which is about everwhere down here), concerned at 7 feet, sweating at 6 ft and grimicing at 5 feet.

This past Memorial Week End I spent way too much time in the ICW south of Key Biscayne (Middle Keys) at low tide and was constantly blowing sand in the ICW channel at idle. I had three "Firm" groundings in sand, man my wheels are polished all shiney! I could not get up on a plane as my stern would squat and make matters worse. It was a stressful ride until I got out into deeper water.

Note to file. If you are in known shallow water, watch for a YaHoo skipper that is running flat out. Fall in behind him and watch his wake. He'll leave sand trails that you can see long in advance and slow down and ghost over the knobs to spare your props, bearings and pump impellers.
 
Last edited:
Since they are pushing all that water out to form their huge wake is it shallower in their wake. Or. Since they are pushing out all the sand and cleaning the bottom is is deeper. Inquiring minds want to know.
 
here on the great south bay,4-5 feet is deep.Coming from my marina to the channel at low tide reads 3 feet.then I cringe a bit..
 
I solve the problem by plotting my courses so I don't below 9 feet of water. The cost of pulling the boat and sending the props out to be reconditioned is a tad to much, so nine feet is lthe limit.
 
Mr Salt you must never turn right and go to Wildwood in your boat!!!! If I remember from my hazy youth days it was tough to find 9 ft down the channel to Wildwood Crest and forget about going past Rio Grande Av bridge. Or course I have missed the many twists and turns of the channel from Wildwood to Grassy Sounds many a time in our OLD 22' cuddy. But I still have a soft spot for the shore! Some day we may come up the Bay to Cape May... Beautiful Boat by the way!!! I don't miss the green heads...
 
In Clearwater we regularly boat in less than 6 feet of water. Nature of the area. Gotta know what the depths are all around. At three feet when not on plane I get concerned.
 
I worry when I read 4' on the smartcraft depth finder anything less then that I stop and figure out where I went wrong.
 
When i read 1.6 I know i really messed up ;-)

On a serious note, outside my slip on low tide i sometimes read 2.5 :-/ In the great south bay, i get nervous when i am under 4.
 
1.5' is the shallowest i've ever been in. well it was dancing between 1-1.5'. I could have snapped a fork in half with my butt on that one.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Forum statistics

Threads
113,267
Messages
1,429,710
Members
61,146
Latest member
bmel
Back
Top