have a mudbuddy, early series and was wondering if anyone knew of a cavitation plate that could be added to the lower unit measuring 36" on a surface drive. I have looked and found one from advantage mudmotors but it is not listed on their website. Any ideas or anyone ever accomplished adding one to this series of mudmotor?

Why do you want to add a cavitation plate to a surface drive motor?


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Well actually my motor is a small little horsepower and I have no issues with mine. My buddy has the exact same frame with a Vanguard 35 hp that has upgrades. I have thought about upgrading my motor to the same horsepower but the issue he keeps running into is at a certain rpm his prop wants to jump out of the water. It is super obnoxious and I have run his boat to see what he keeps complaining of and sure enough, anything past half throttle down (with motor trimmed all the way down) the prop wants to come right out of the water. His setup came up exactly how it is set up, so the only thing he did was upgrade heads and other little bolt on accessories to his motor. So we were thinking if there was a way to add a cavitation plate to the lower unit, it would help keep the prop down in the water. We noticed the newer setups from mudbuddy have them and we thought about upgrading our lower units to the 32" version (which was the new generation of lower units) but I do not think they even come with a cavitation plate. If need be, I can add pictures of the units we have so you guys have more of an idea of what we have.

Does the prop have a decent amount of cup still on it?

That I am not sure about, but I know he replaced the prop about a year ago (maybe sooner) and he does not use it near as much as I use mine. I know his prop is in much better shape than mine is.

Why are you trying to go past half throttle with the prop buried?


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Well when we are running full throttle in open water, the throttle wants to jump out of the water. Am I crazy for wanting to hold the throttle down all the way, maxing out RPMS to the governor headed out to a spot on the lake? Is it normal with these motor to only be able to hold down half the throttle without the prop wanting to jump out of the water? I guess I am not getting what is being asked because I know on other mud motors that I have run, I just hold down the throttle in open water, prop stays in the water and motor is maxed out to the governor and I just go. Not with this motor, the prop literally comes out of the water and is a bear to control. I was just thinking a cavitation plate would help since it is seen on newer mud motors. I guess the piece that is needed is the steel plate that sits at an angle above the prop. Is that not a cavitation plate on these mud motors?

The prop should only be in the water 1/2 way


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Yeah, the cav plate doesn't do much on a surface drive once your on plane and running wide open. The prop is a surface piercing prop, which means it performs best when not completely submerged. There are exceptions, but the cav plate isn't supposed to do much in water like it does on a longtail. Something is going on as it shouldn't try to jump out of the water, but it's not from lack of a cav plate.

There are many that don't run a cav plate with no problems, to include my dad's 2004 mb.

What kind of boat do you have? What horsepower besides "small little horsepower"? Power trim or manual? Also, its clearly your buddy who is having this problem and not you right?


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I'd have to guess that there is a transom height issue


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ok so yes this is not on my boat, it is on a buddies boat. I do not have the same problem he is having with mine but my motor has a 1/3 the horsepower his does. He is an older guy that does not have patience for forums so I told him I would do some asking here and see what you all had to say. He has a vanguard 35 hp with modifications, he is saying the motor is built to same specs as a 4400 black death. He has a weldbilt boat, tall transom and it weighs 451lbs. I get that the prop can run half way in the water but when you go all the way down on the throttle, it kicks out of the water all the way and goes all over the place making controlling the thing nearly impossible. You have to let off the throttle, let it back in the water and only able to go about half way down on the throttle to keep it in the water. We have tried letting the prop all the way down (using the trim) and tried to get on the throttle and it does the same thing. The prop just does not want to stay down in the water at full throttle. We were seeing the new designed motors and they all have a cav plate, so we were just assuming that it needed one as well, since this is an older style frame. Is there a measurement based on transom height and how far the frame of the unit should go down?

Pm sent

Don't be tellin' secrets!

It's not a longtail, and not all longtails do that on a tall transom.