Can barely get it to plane out. Tried it on a 1432 and 1236, both very light boats, under 90 lbs. WTF is the deal. I spent over 2K on this thing and extremely dissappointed. Do I need a heavier boat? Wider? Does boat width and weight matter that much? Im going to call the mfg'er later today but could use some thought from you guys too.

I had a 9.5 go devil on a 14x44 and it would plane with me and gear but not with anything more. Your not gonna get anywhere fast with that motor but you will get there. Maybe put it on a wider boat and give it a shot, but I doubt it.

6.5 horse is an awfully small motor. Copperhead?

Is it an Orion, a Copperhead, or a homemade one that somebody built?
Without much info I don't think anyone could say much besides have a mechanic check the engine itself. It should do fine with a 1236 but yes, a motor that small is extremely sensitive to weight. One other thing I just thought of.... my 12' boat has a 12" transom but most of the motors are made for 15" transom unless you specifically request one for a 12" transom. That could definitely add drag...

I only ran it for a half hour over my lunch break. I believe the issue is the boat,probably transom height the way it sounds. Im going to try to run it on a few different models before I give up. I dont want to throw the manufacturer under the bus just yet, but it was one of the manufactured ones.

If I could get 15 mph I would be happy.

He asked muddoctor if he was a Copperhead dealer. So I'm thinking he may have bought one of them.
Jerad, we need to know what the motor is exactly.

I may have an answer for you.

It is an orion. I didnt want to say to lead people on that this is a bad motor. It is built strong and they have been great to deal with.

If the shaft is too long for the transom, that could possibly put the shaft tilted more up than down which would cause a loss of power because there would not be anything but air to push against. That is just conjecture though. You could always try a smaller pitch prop too. Good luck! I hope you can get it figured out!

If, and I mean If, it is similiar to the Copperhead in drive, I suggest looking at a different prop with the load you are trying to carry. I was having a few issues with my prop but got a new one and everything is much better now.

Is the prop shaft threaded or keyed? Try something i nthe 9x7 size with a bit of cup. That is what is working for me with same load and boat you are trying to run.

Oh, and how tall is the transom? Mines 15 on my 1436.

My new plan is to put some float pods on the boat to help it plane faster. The guy at Orion also said he would have the prop reworked, free of charge.

the prop is threaded.

I figured out the first two boats I tried the motor on were 12" transoms. The latest one had a 15" and it was better but still not where it should be.

Anybody every put pods on a 12'er. I see on the web plans for pods but they are all 14' or more. Personally I think pods will help alot on this little boat.

Make sure all your dead weight is just forward of center. This helped me out alot. With my boat being narrow, it was drafting a good bit in the back.

CMILLER...

Can I touch your avatar?

Your saying the speed on a 1436 is going to be better than the 1236? Why is that?

If you plan to get a 1436, make sure it is a light one. With only having 6.5hp, anything heavy will just add to your issues.

I'm telling you, these guys all talk about speeds they get with these little motors. After buying my copperhead, I found that the prop that was on it, didn't work well with how I need the boat to run. I wound up getting gil to send me a different prop. The new one is a 9x7 with a good bit of cup on the tips. With my 1436 just about loaded for hunting, the speed is back to where it should be.

I'm still waiting on a TinyTach filter to hopefully fix my RPM reading issues. Then I can get some better numbers and see exactly what more I will be able to do with the prop.

I am not familar with the Orion surface drive, I have heard it is similar to the copperhead, but something must be very different, our 6.5 Copperhead is running 14-17 mph on a 180 lb 1236 Prowler model boat. I know of two others is the same situation as you who called us for help, both got the orion surface drives and both can't get the speeds and performance on a 1432 jon boats that we are getting with the copperhead (we had an old 1432 .060 jon we used as a test boat to get a baseline for speeds before we built our Prowler boats). I am guessing something is different with the prop or the pully ratio that is making those motor run so slow compared to the Copperheads we are running.

Just my thoughts.

PW

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Again, I am not sure what the difference is between the two, I only know we have been getting good performance from the Cooperhead and everyone we have sold them to seems very pleased with them, as are we with the ones we have been running on our test boats.

PW

So what are the differences between these two motors? The only ones I know of is that the Orion has a clutch whereas the Copperhead doesnt and the drive belts are different. Do they have the same size prop?

Ive been thinking about this all morning. Does a centrifugal clutch have power loss? It cant be 100% efficient.

Can't be that much loss in the clutch. I'm thinking it has to be gearing that makes the difference. If the gearing is that far off to pick up speed, I can't see how it would have enough torque to do very well in the mud though... Least they're puttin them on itty bitty little boats, so they should be easy to push out when you get stuck.

I was looking at the Orion site, the speeds they quoted are "top speeds" and they note that deep water speeds are up to 1/2 less, i.e. 14-15 mph shallow = 7-10 mph deep and that is what the guys who called me are getting. They also noted that you will only see a "rooster tail" in shallow, not in deep water running, that tells me they are not running a true surface running prop or they have a completely different running depth/angle they are designed to run at. The copperheads we are running all run at the surface all the time, shallow or deep they throw a roostertail 3-5 feet height when trimed correctly, just like the PD or GT big motors do.

Not sure what the clutch takes away from the hp at the prop, probably not much. Again, I have not run one of these motors, this is just what I found on the web and from the few folks we have talked with who are trying them out.

PW

Also to add to what muddoc said, the copperhead does not have a clutch. It's 1.5-1 belt drive. From what Gil told me, they tried adding a cent. clutch to the copperhead. However it just was too much of slippage on the drive belt. Direct belt drive is best for small motors like this.

so how easy is it going to be to change my orion over to the 1.5-1 belt?

Yes I understand, its just like how a grain auger is connected to an electric motor or how motor cycle sprockets work. The sprocket on the motor has to be smaller than the one on the prop shaft. I dont know if I want to tear this thing apart or not.

Also, for what its worth. I was TOLD that this motor does indeed have a surface piercing prop. Whether this is true or not im not sold on. I can get it to make a huge rooster tail but the prop has absolutely NO bite at that point.

Find out what size and pitch of prop are they putting on their motors. I read it's a Hopkins prop. Which shold be pretty close to what Copperhead is using. But the prop that came with mine, really didn't work on my hull. So I got Gil to send me another after he told Hopkins (they are in the same building) what was going on with mine. Mine was just boiling the water and not giving much forward thrust with the boat loaded for hunting. The prop I got from him now, has much more bite and now has a rooster tail. Still may need to be tweaked, but is much better than the original.
If you are having the same issues as me, get Orion to swap your prop out. Tell them, you want the one Hopkins is now selling for the 6.5hp motors. Problem is, if the cup on the new motor is too much, the clutch may slip like they mention would happen in mud.

i took a peak at the web site, ill bet you could delete the clutch and add a fixed gear to the crank shaft w/o to much problem. then you could match the gear raito and prop.

i know the cent. clutch sounds good but it will leave you stranded on question. the big motors cant run them so i cant think they will be any better on a small motor. plus the idleing is what will kill thm in the first place.

Here goes nothing. I sent the Orion back to NY, $600 lighter out of my pocket.
I tried this motor on several boats but finally got sick of it, missing alot of the duck season here. I warned the owner that I would blast his motor on the internet if he didnt give me a better refund but he refused so now my mission, after cashing his check, is to tell my story here.

He wanted to send me a tach and a longer handle. These would not have helped this motor. There is something majorly wrong with his setup.

I called and talked to the guy at Copperhead, whose shop is attached to the shop where they make the props for the Orions. I guess the guy from Orion only ever tried one prop on his motor. He must be pretty good to get it right on the first try. What a joke.

This motor wouldnt plane out any of the boats I tried it on so I called him, he told me to add weight to the front, tried that, still sucked. Then he claimed I was using the motor in too deep of water. Tried it in 12" and less, still sucked.

I think the v-belt and clutch are loosing too much power in the transfer to the prop.

This motor is poorly designed and doesnt perform, PERIOD! Please do not buy one.

Man, that totally frickin' suckz that you had to lose $600 bucks on returning it.
Better thn being stuck with it though. Good on ya for giving the rest of us the heads up on the Orion so we don't make the same mistake. Thanks, it's appreciated bro.

So what's next? A copperhead? If so, please let me know how it performs on the 1236.

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