I have a 1438 jon boat with a homemade front deck with a bow mount trolling motor and particle board floors in the boat so its pretty heavy. What size surface drive should i get to push this boat right? Or would a 12hp Copperhead be enough

image.jpgI love my 12 copperhead it will impress u ... They got the gearing and prop getting max out put ... I'm getting 20 mph one man and with my partner at 340 lb get 17 mph and 2 tree stands 2 battery's on 1648 boat

This helps a lot! Thank you for the response.

I talked to Betsy today at copperhead about buying the 14 kolher ... The 12 still runs good but I'm wanting more power ... Not sure if its worth it ... Any one got advise

I run my 16 hp copperhead on a 1436 jonboat and it runs great. I don't know the mph it runs. With me and my dog and gear it is plenty of motor for the job.

With a 38" bottom the 12 or 14 should be good, but any bigger and you may have problems with the boat squatting which will negatively affect performance in mud. I would not expect any 14 hp to outrun the 12 by much if at all. The LCT 12 has similar displacement as Briggs and Kohler 14's. I posted the displacement numbers on some other post and don't feel like looking it up again. I have not gotten to run one but the Kohler 14 intrigues me because the engine is probably better built than the LCT so I would give it consideration myself.

Either way, I would get rid of the heavy particle board floor. That stuff soaks up water like a sponge and probably will disintegrate anyway. Make a lighter one out of 3/8 plywood and 2x2's. It's not like it costs that much. The 12 will run awesome with 2 people and gear. For 3 People I would recommend an 18. Your boat is a little skinny for the 18 though. It could be done and it would run ok, but might squat a little, especially if your boat is already heavy. There is no comparison on the engines once you go to the 18. The vtwin Vanguard is so much smoother (probably the Kohler 18 version as well but the extra 15 lbs over the Vanguard would not be good for your boat). The 12 can go anywhere the 18 can go though and sometimes more places because it is so light that the boat floats so high that you can go over shallow hard bottoms that you cannot go across with a heavier engine making the boat squat.

Anyway, just think of the 12 or 14 as the perfect motor for small two man rigs, and the 18 or bigger for 3+ people. I have a video on my review with the 12 doing 21 mph on my boat with two people and basic hunting gear. I never used a battery with the 12 even though I had the electric start option as it always pull started just fine, though I do recall the LCT needing warming up on cold mornings. I ran my running lights off a 12 volt rechargeable like the ones they put in Mojo's in case you are wondering.

The 12 is hardly a turd. One of the guys I hunt with runs a GT and another runs a Prodrive and I could get on step with a 12 Copperhead in places they could not. Where could a 12 possibly get up that a GT could not? A few inches of water over a hard bottom. The big surface drive boats could haul a55 until they stopped, and then they were screwed. On a real hard bottom you cannot dig at all so the only thing that matters is how light your rig is. I am sure it is heresy to say this on MMT, but in a similar case a long tail kicked all the surface drives a55's. How could that happen? The water was about up to the prop nut on the surface drives. The ones that could not float once stopped could not move. The ones with lighter surface drives that could partially float were still screwed because with only half the prop in the water and not being able to dig, the prop torque from only one side touching would make the boat turn hard to the side and crash into the trees or get out of the rut we were using to take off in. The longtail had a much smaller diameter prop so it did not have the prop torque problem, but we did have to push it some to help the driver take off. In this case over hard bottom like that, there is something even better than longtails and surface drives - a four wheeler LOL. The only reason we don't use them any more is because it is an extra hour vehicle ride to the other side of the lake and an extra half hour on the 4 wheeler so an extra hour and half vs using the boat.

Another benefit of the small engines is demonstrated by the MMT Emergency contacts list. When big rigs get stuck, they are stuck. I go run by myself in my little rig all the time because I can get my tail out of a bind on my own. I dragged my boat 100 yards across dry land by myself last hunting season because I can pick it up by myself. Also last year both myself and my buddy with the Prodrive beached ourselves in the fog. I can drag my boat back to the water by myself. For the big Prodrive boat it took all of the passengers from 3 boats to drag his boat back to the water.

With that said, the small engines are not competition for the big engines. You can't put the bigi engines on really small boats and you can't put the small engines on really big boats. GT has obvious benefits of its own like being able to haul 4 or 5 people which you will not be doing with the 12 hp engine (actually I did do it once with the 12 but we definitely did not get on step and we were plowing but we did eventually make it to the blind). The GT also has reverse which you need with those big barges. My little boat is so small I can turn it around in places that even my 15 foot boat wouldn't have a snow-flake's chance in hell of turning around in. If you are the type like some of my friends that want to haul 5 or 6 people to the blind and haul a55 doing it, then the GT is the obvious answer, but the little motors have their place as well.

I second what cheesy poof said....
Lightweight rig, if you're hunting alot by yourself... with the 12 you wont have an albatross to unstick....just limit your gear to the essentials and you will enjoy the boat

I'm going on my third season with my copperhead, and the performance of that little motor has impressed me to no end. I see where you're from N. FL and I assume I know where you'll be hunting, so this is what I'll tell you...go with the 12, and go with the Briggs. Don't buy the LCT, they may not even offer those anymore, as I know they're about to make the transition to Briggs completely. The Briggs is more reliable and is a much smoother, quieter engine than the LCT.

The Briggs doesn't have electric start yet ... They working on that ... Briggs got more torque than the kohler but its got electric start

The Briggs only has manual start as of now, but they'll be offering an electric start version soon. I sacrificed the electric start when I switched from LCT to Briggs a few months ago. I liked having it on my LCT, but it isn't a necessity--now it's just one less thing to have to worry about breaking.

Any noticeable gains by going to the briggs? I the 12 lct it ran good but rough and loud

The Briggs is just a better engine in general...from fit and finish to performance. I was going on my third LCT engine when I decided to make the switch to Briggs and wipe my hands clean of LCT. In my experience, they don't assemble them at the factory to withstand the constant bouncing and vibration associated with use on a mudmotor, and numerous times I had bolts come out of the case, magnets break loose from the fly-wheel, and my last one finally blew up while I was running it. That being said, some guys have had no problems with the LCT engines whatsoever. I wasn't one of them.

Which is better ... Briggs or kohler ... I'm thinking the Briggs got more power and the kohler is quiter and smoother of the three ... My lct has been a good motor but she is loud and rough ..

My Kohler surprised me at how smooth and quiet it was.
I really wanted the Briggs but I let the crew at Copperhead talk me into the Kohler and I don't regret it one bit. For only 4 extra pounds compared to the Briggs (if I have my figures correct) you get electric start in addition to recoil start. And if you go with remote fuel you get most if not all of that 4lb difference back. The tank on the Kohler is made out of what can only be described as an allow of depleted uranium and heavyashellium.

I haven't had a chance to run the Briggs so I can't comment on it's noise or smoothness....

I order the kohler today ... I'll give full reviews later .. Compared to lct 12 ... Then after that gonna put steel flex on the bottom to see if that helps speed

Dunno if you read my initial review with the Copperhead 12 and the Steelflex. The bottom coatings don't really speed you up in water, they just help you slide over grass, mud, etc which they do very well. The steelflex actually holds up pretty well as long as you keep it away from rocks at the boat ramp and don't pull the boat up on the concrete ramp to load up. This will tear up the coating no matter which one you choose. If that happens, since Steelflex is generally thicker, chunks get torn off which may induce more to come off, which can actually slow you down. If you actually have a decent boat ramp (there is nowhere one can park at ours without pulling up on the rocks/concrete), it should wear pretty well. This year I bought some Gatorglide which I am going to try for comparison. I suspect the Steelflex will outlast the Gatorglide if you stay off of rocks, but the Gatorglide looks like it will be easier to reapply when it is time to recoat.

I look forward to seeing your review as I have not gotten to run one with the Kohler.