Help me clean up my wake on my RZ4

[auburntigegal]

So we're all fairly new to wakeboarding. Started early last year on my cousin's X-Star. The whole family fell in love with it and we had to get our own boat.
We ended up with the RZ4 mostly cause we found a dealer demo with 30 hours on it that would trade our Tahoe Q8i for a really decent price. We are absolutely thrilled with the boat! However, we don't have enough experience with the wakeboarding. I know this boat is huge and makes a huge wake. The wake is so far apart at 65-75 feet, plus we get lots of white wash, except in one spot on the left side (at about 50-60 feet it's clean), but on the right side we're getting white wash.
How do we make this cleaner?
We are all newbies so we are running about 19 mph. Much faster and we all bust it all the time. I can switch now from left foot forward to right foot forward and get some air jumping left foot forward (I make it about 3/4 of the way across).
Just looking for that clean wake!!

[Fiveflat]

You need to go faster.

You need to move people around in the boat. I was just at a wakeboard tournament this past weekend and I was literally shifting my weight left and right with the rider as little as a couple inches on the back seat to help clean up the wake since she was riding so slow.
Try a person in the bow and then another on the back seat and inch yourself toward the white wash until it cleans up.
If both sides are white wash, you need more speed.

[chpthril]

Thats a big boat to get a clean wake at 19MPH. For that speed and your skill level, 50-55ft line length is where you should be riding IMO. Use the TAPS to help clean up the wash, as well as moving some weight left/right or to the front. Other then that, upping the speed is the key.

[auburntigegal]

Does using the ballast help? If so, where? We have the pro ballast system - 600 on each rear and 400 each front.

[Fiveflat]

If you all are beginners, leave them empty and just use taps.

[auburntigegal]

Seems to have the cleanest wake with taps on 1, if I move the taps up, it seems to get worse. Guess we need to suck it up and go faster!

[chpthril]

Does using the ballast help? If so, where? We have the pro ballast system - 600 on each rear and 400 each front.

I would try adding a little up front, but I feel that if you are confortable at that slower speed, then just shorten the line to where you noticed it was clean. No right/wrong TAPS position. It will change with speed, weight and weight placement, so just keep expeirmenting with it till you get a feel for it.

[lohe]

Like others have said. Shorten the rope a bit I started really close at a slower speed once you get more comfatable you can lengthen it and increase the speed. Just try 21-22mph and see how it goes with riding and the white wash. I would not add to much weight yet until you guys get a little better feel for it try other taps settings and speeds

[auburntigegal]

Sounds great folks! We're off work Wednesday and Thursday! Can't wait - not many folks out, weather's looking perfect. Hoping for some glass!! Last Wednesday we went out at 7 am, come in for 45 minutes for lunch, then back out til 9pm!! We've got 115 hours on our boat already! Gonna dial that wake in! Thanks for the all the help!

[embo]

Sounds great folks! We're off work Wednesday and Thursday! Can't wait - not many folks out, weather's looking perfect. Hoping for some glass!! Last Wednesday we went out at 7 am, come in for 45 minutes for lunch, then back out til 9pm!! We've got 115 hours on our boat already! Gonna dial that wake in! Thanks for the all the help!

That's the boat I wanna be on. All day fun!!! :bo: We try to do the same!

[shawn74]

60'rope,full bow and even out passengers with largest center rear moving left to right little at a time,my rz4 is very sensitive to weight change and takes good balance for even wakes

[jmitchell]

All boats, sizes, weights, number of people, rope length, etc. are different from person to person but my experience has been to not pay as much attention to speed and taps as much as watch what the wake looks like. I would start with the shortest rope length possible (no extensions). Mine is 65'. From there adjust the speed somewhere between 19-22mph until the wake is cresting where the rider position is. You don't want the wake turning over at the rider position. Then lastly, adjust the taps to the desired wake height, but wouldn't recommend anything over Taps 4. Also, with adjusting the taps you may have to speed up slightly to keep the wake clean. To me its all about feel and appearance of the wake more than a specific setting until you get those settings dialed in finally. On our Z1, I ride at 21mph and Taps 4.

Just my two cents, I'm no expert by any means, but this thought process has worked wonders for many levels of riders on many types of boats.

[robert theisen]

If you go to facebook i have a video of a nice wake with no ballast in my RZ2.I'm on a 75' rope at 22.5 mph . If you shortened your rope to 60' you could slow down to 19 or 20 mph and taps no more than 4.Wakeboarding is more about body position and technique than speed and strength.Learnwake.com or the dvd THE BOOK are also helpful.Also to clean up side to side move weight to the side with the wash,if that doesn't clean it up just speed up 1/2 mph.

[Moki]

Yeah, like everybody has said, speed and balance are your friend. My wake cleans up at 20+, but don't let a little white wash get you down. It is still a great wake at slower speeds.

[auburntigegal]

Oh, we had fun today! Thanks for all the tips! We went a little faster. Added a little weight. Still had some wash but it was cleaner! How do you do a 180 switch? I can do it at 17 mph, but faster and I'm faceplanting!

[robert theisen]

Oh, we had fun today! Thanks for all the tips! We went a little faster. Added a little weight. Still had some wash but it was cleaner! How do you do a 180 switch? I can do it at 17 mph, but faster and I'm faceplanting!

IT'S all handle and body position.I'll DO A VIDEO THIS WEEKEND.

[bigdaddy_houseboater]

Hey Aub, a really easy way to do a 180 is to pull out toe side, make your turn and pull to the wake. When you pop, release the handle with your heel side hand. The pull will rotate you with your toe side hand forward. It's pretty automatic. Amintain your vertical body position with pull on the rope to keep from catching the nose or an edge.

[Fiveflat]

Hey Aub, a really easy way to do a 180 is to pull out toe side, make your turn and pull to the wake. When you pop, release the handle with your heel side hand. The pull will rotate you with your toe side hand forward. It's pretty automatic. Amintain your vertical body position with pull on the rope to keep from catching the nose or an edge.

That's called a halfcab. they are easy to learn because you always want to rotate back to your normal stance.

[robert theisen]

That's called a halfcab. they are easy to learn because you always want to rotate back to your normal stance.

I think she is referring to a surface 180.

[Fiveflat]

Ah, there are a couple ways to interpret her question now that I go back and read it again.

A 180 to switch?
A Switch 180 (halfcab)?
A surface 180 to switch?

Hrm....

[bigdaddy_houseboater]

Ah, there are a couple ways to interpret her question now that I go back and read it again.

A 180 to switch?
A Switch 180 (halfcab)?
A surface 180 to switch?

Hrm....
How about a half switch half 180 full cab monkey grab...
We want pictures.

[auburntigegal]

Lol! We're beginners remember! A surface 180 is what i'm lookin to accomplish first. And getting some air, which we're all doin pretty good.

[jmitchell]

Glad the wake is improving for you. Depending on your fin configuration and size, surface 180's can be difficult or otherwise easy. Large center fins can give too much bight on the water and it will be very difficult to spin 180. On the flip side, short outer quad or dual fins make spinning relatively easy. Also helps to have a nice 'rocker' to your board (flat spot in the middle). You should try a wakeskate also to learn the balance between regular and goofy foot. A wakeskate is very easy to spin. Slightly lean back and as you rotate the board in the water shift the weighting from one foot to the other, then stay back opposite hand/foot as you normally would.

[auburntigegal]

Ok! I probably need to take the center fins off my hyperlite and can get that 180 down! Me and my daughter ride one board and I think we are both ready to take those off. My husband's Ronix has a little center fin and he's got the 180 down pretty good. Thanks for all the help!

[robert theisen]

Ok! I probably need to take the center fins off my hyperlite and can get that 180 down! Me and my daughter ride one board and I think we are both ready to take those off. My husband's Ronix has a little center fin and he's got the 180 down pretty good. Thanks for all the help!

How tall are the center fins?Technique will conquer any center fin.;)

[ccole]

YouTube is your friend :) search some how to videos, will really help you to see how it's done and the technique.

[wakerider3989]

How tall are the center fins?Technique will conquer any center fin.;)

Amen!

[ragboy]

The 180 can be tough, because then you have to ride backwards. Try this:

JL2rDVS4SwY

[Greg Mallek]

Love It :)

[bigdaddy_houseboater]

I wanna see the fat guy at Wake 9 do the 180....

[Fiveflat]

I wanna see the fat guy at Wake 9 do the 180....

Robert's cool. Dennis actually made a board for him to finally get up on once. Glad to see Robert get to surf! :ro:

He delivers great info to the wakesurf community that's for sure. :bo:

[ragboy]

I can do it no problem, we just need a wider angle lens to capture it. D'oh!

[bigdaddy_houseboater]

I can do it no problem, we just need a wider angle lens to capture it. D'oh!

Next trick.. teaching you how to barefoot....:rolleyes:
I need a thicker boom though.
:p

[ragboy]

I don't need a boom, I just strap on to the outboard. Its not that hard, just have to spread your legs a bit. For some reason when I tried the boom, it was too low, bad design I guess.

[bigdaddy_houseboater]

Mine sits pretty high. Im thinking your weight on a boom might make for a damned good passenger side wake surf wake.. lol

[ragboy]

Or a capsizing....

[bigdaddy_houseboater]

Or a capsizing....

bahaha.. ok I like Robert. He's got a bitchin sense of humor.
May have to plan a West Coast Tige get together at the houseboat... whatcha think, Flat?

[Fiveflat]

Ha, in the Delta!

[bigdaddy_houseboater]

you gonna have 20 people on a 36' Gib? I think not... Pine Flat.

[auburntigegal]

That is so cool!! I'm gonna do it!! I'll post my video when I do! LOL!

[auburntigegal]

You guys gonna have to take a trip down south to Bama!

[robert theisen]

Here's the surface 180's before and after the wake jump.I can't get the video to load but it's on my facebook page titled surface 180's.

[Gwyn]

Had my RZ4 about 3 weeks now, mine is 08 so only 900lbs ballast, but we found the front ballast seems to clean the wake the most, fully loaded and it really ramps up, got to play around with it everytime, havent read whole thread so hope you have it sorted, speed is definately the biggest help, me, my son and my buddy board at 21-22 depending on the sea conditions, my wife and my buddys wife run at 17-19 can usually clean it up enough though.

Also been trying new tricks, learnwake is great, and i have just order a copy of The Book, been trying a HS backroll this weekend from Learnwake, very easy way to learn it, havent got it yet but this is as far as I got on saturday !

[robert theisen]

:D

[auburntigegal]

We had a great Saturday and Sunday on the lake! Saturday was Aquapalooza at Honeycomb, Lake Guntersville and there were so many boats, we only surfed - way too rough for wakeboarding.
But today was awesome!! We took off our center fins. I'm running about 19 mph now and getting most of my surface 180's down! I'm getting air and making about 3/4 of the way across the wake, and it's really wide at 60 ft (which is as short as my rope will go unless I want to tie a knot in it). Rest of family is improving too!! Only bummer thing that happened today was we lost a pin in the swim platform (thankfully at the end of the day - though it did cut us out of about an hour of boating time :(. The wake still has some white wash, but we're improving it! I'll work with the front ballast some! Thanks for all of ya'lls help!

[robert theisen]

We had a great Saturday and Sunday on the lake! Saturday was Aquapalooza at Honeycomb, Lake Guntersville and there were so many boats, we only surfed - way too rough for wakeboarding.
But today was awesome!! We took off our center fins. I'm running about 19 mph now and getting most of my surface 180's down! I'm getting air and making about 3/4 of the way across the wake, and it's really wide at 60 ft (which is as short as my rope will go unless I want to tie a knot in it). Rest of family is improving too!! Only bummer thing that happened today was we lost a pin in the swim platform (thankfully at the end of the day - though it did cut us out of about an hour of boating time :(. The wake still has some white wash, but we're improving it! I'll work with the front ballast some! Thanks for all of ya'lls help!

If you speed up to 21 mph it will clean up your wake.At 60 foot 20 to 20.5 might even be enough.Also as you speeed up the board rotates easier.

[adamsjstt]

bahaha.. ok I like Robert. He's got a bitchin sense of humor.
May have to plan a West Coast Tige get together at the houseboat... whatcha think, Flat?

Sounds interesting......how is pine flat lake?

[auburntigegal]

Went out Wednesday and Thursday. Pulled my cousin at 22 mph. He rode at 65 ft and the wake was beautiful. Very clean! Looked awesome! He clears it! Gets great air! It was late afternoon - I was driving, husband took pics, but he had the setting all wrong on the camera - so no good pics. Thanks again for the advice!! I am sore today from getting pulled so many times past 2 days! Boat has 180 hours on it now! :ro:

[auburntigegal]

Found 3 decent pics from Wednesday. My cousin riding at 22 mph with the crappy pic settings, but you can see the wake pretty good and how it cleaned up. Last is me at 20 mph - white wash on the right and clean on the left (of course I can only jump right to left right now - but I'm workin on it!)

[Fiveflat]

180hrs already? :ro: when I was boat shopping last year I couldn't believe all the 8-10 year old boat with less than 200 hrs on them How does that happen? I bought a 12 year old boat with only 180 hours on it. I just don't get it.

In those wake pics, whats your ballast setup like? Particularly for your cousin?


(PS: you need a little more weight on your starboard side in that first pic of your cousin - unless he was cutting like crazy but I don't think that was the case)

[auburntigegal]

Yep! We're die hard, lol! We go out every Wednesday and Thursday, most Saturday afternoons and all day Sundays!!
We had 50% full in the front, empty back, taps on 1, only me and my husband in boat! My husband moved back and forth on the back seat to get that last little white wash out as my cousin rode back and forth.
Any more advice?

[Fiveflat]

Speed is all that's killin' you. My son is 9 yrs old and he rides at 22.5MPH. At that speed, it's just barely cleaning up and I'm barely weighted for him. (400lbs in bow and empty in the back).

[auburntigegal]

Thanks Five.
My husband is the hard head and is scared to speed up with me and my kids (ages 10 and 11). I keep tellin him to go faster, but he wants to work us towards that. He's afraid we're gonna get hurt!! My cousin tells him it hurts just as bad at 20 mph as it does at 22 and to just speed up, but what can you tell a hard headed man!!

[auburntigegal]

189 hours now Five!

Whole family is getting our surface 180's down!
Water today was rough!! Had to be at least 100 tubers out today:(. We surfed mostly. My 10 yr old daughter did about 30 ollies :). She's so excited.

Five, we started our season at end of April with wetsuits on. We got the boat in September, but was able to suit up and was out until almost end of October too!

We're lucky that our work schedule allows us 4 days every week if the weather works with us to go out! Every morning as we out, someone yells as we are loading up, "I'm surfing first!", then someone else, "I'm wakeboarding first!" The boat runs constantly once we are on it. The hours have just racked up somehow :ro:!

My cousin that's in all my pics swears by Mastercraft (though he's been pulled more on my boat this year that his - WAY more!). We had went to his Mastercraft dealer, Lex in Hazel Green, AL. He was very nice and the Mastercraft's were beautiful - our fav was the X-45 - but he talked to Joey (cousin) and was like, "man i hate i didn't sale them that boat". Joey told him, "Don't worry, they'll have it wore out in 2-3 years and will need another one!" lol!

We've always been on the lake, just new to the inboard boat and surfingand wakeboarding! Bets the heck out of tubing!!

If anyone's ever near Huntsville, AL give us a shout!

[auburntigegal]

Update on our wake - it cleans good at 22-23. We have really gotten in some good sets lately!
Here's pics from today!
The wake still has some white wash on the starboard side, my husband pulled me at 20.6 today - woohoo!! That's as fast as he would go....
But I got some good air, landed it about 3/4 of the way across, crossed on over, made my surface 180 (Yeah!!), then got a little air right foot forward (my weak side!).
It was so fun today! Great water!

[robert theisen]

Sounds like your husband doesn't want you to show him up.LOL

[pzbilly]

the wake shape is now good from the last picture. U should go for 21, and set the tap at level 3 with rope distance at around 64ft plus set the front ballast at 75% rear with 50% loaded .

[auburntigegal]

You are right about that RT!
We keep playing with the ballast.... I'll try your setup pz!
Maybe the hubby will work me on up to 21 or 22 this weekend!!
It's like in that old Chevy Chase movie - "You Bastard!" "Did he say Go Faster?"
Except I'm behind the boat sayin "Go Faster!" - maybe hubby doesn't understand...:p

[CountryDMan]

Hey auburntigegal, did you ever get that wake dialed in? I have just recently purchased an RZ4 and am having the same difficulties you mentioned earlier in this thread. I can ride at 22 and the wake is pretty clean, but any slower it is washed out. From reading this thread it seems that faster speed would fix most of the issues (just gonna have to get my buddies convinced to ride/crash that fast). Would be nice to get a clean wake for my buddies at 19mph.

[jmhatchett]

IMO if you have NO WEIGHT on the boat and put the rope at 55' or max 60' then you MIGHT be able to get a decently clean wake at 20. Taps at 1 maybe and no weight.

I personally ride at 80' rope, with about 2500 lbs ballast, then usually 8-10 people. I set speed at 24 and play with taps to clean up wake face. It really is amazing how an extra 1 mph can help lengthen the clean face of the wake.

[rensink]

I owned 2 Rz4's and unfortunately they like to go FAST for good clean wakes... when we rode behind the Rz4 we all we're riding 23.8-24.8 depending on the ballast and people.. I'd speed it up a MPH or two and leave the taps at 2-3. On my Rz2 we are running 4,000lbs speed at 23.8ish and it's a super fun wake!

[auburntigegal]

Hey auburntigegal, did you ever get that wake dialed in? I have just recently purchased an RZ4 and am having the same difficulties you mentioned earlier in this thread. I can ride at 22 and the wake is pretty clean, but any slower it is washed out. From reading this thread it seems that faster speed would fix most of the issues (just gonna have to get my buddies convinced to ride/crash that fast). Would be nice to get a clean wake for my buddies at 19mph.

We were doing pretty good towards the last of the season. Just have to increase that speed. I've tried all kinds of weight set up at slower speeds, but until we get up to 22 as well it washes some. If I can remember right, we fill the front all the way and the back 50%. My hubby's been in Kansas City most of this year and he's coming home tmrw :ro: We're planning on hitting the water Wednesday, so I'll try to get some pics and update our setup!!
Oh and when we fill all the way and go 22-24, the wake is HUGE

[auburntigegal]

We had really rough water today. We all rode pretty slow! Waves was washing some. We left ballast empty and ran about 20-21. Better at 21 but still not like I want it. Will have better water next time I hope!