[aewrigh]

its a design flaw of the 80 lb and up motors. The 70 and down have a skeg that is molded onto the main housing which will not spin. The larger motors have a skeg molded onto the back piece of the motor and it is a crappy design. Twist it on a rock and it will break the o-ring and get water inside. Twist it bad enough and you have even bigger problems as stated above. I will have to look into it further but I don't know if you can twist one because the brush plate is bolted to it but you might be able to flip the whole brush plate. If somebody else finds out before me let me know.

 

[aewrigh]

They have everything to do with prop protection. Shear pins are there more to transfer motion to the prop without having to use some kind of taper-lock device than for motor shaft protection. Trolling motors don't have enough torque to twist a shaft in two pieces. If you think that a skeg gives you much steering then that is wrong as well. Physics doesn't lie. If you take a 20 foot boat with chines and measure all of the surfaces that keep a boat going straight (5-10 chines at 20 feet long apiece), there is no way a 10 square inch skeg is going to provide enough steering to overcome everything else working against it. The steering comes from the changing direction in water thrust.....if that wasn't so, you would have a stationary motor with a steerable skeg. Just my opinion and 2 cents worth......

Brushless motor would work but your still gonna have to have one end semi open that the prop attaches to so still kind of pointless and really expensive. What are you guys hitting to bend the skeg? Also the skegs are there to help turn and steer. The troller would be way less efficient if it was gone. They are there for a reason just like on all outboards. If they didn't serve a purpose the factory wouldn't put them on there. They have nothing to do with prop protection. If they did no one would ever bend a prop or shear a pin.

 

[aewrigh]

Let me push your boat towards a waterfall at 4-5 miles per hour.....all you can use is your trolling motor skeg and outboard skeg to steer. We'll see how well that works for ya. Trolling motors weren't designed to be ran in close proximities to the bottom as us bowfishers run them. There is an aspect of sales that include asthetics and a big stainless ring around a prop wouldn't exactly be sexy, sleek, and low profile. They put skegs on trolling motors for when people aren't paying attention and run up on rocks and other like underwater obstructions. The skeg drags and says "hey big dummy, you are too shallow and my prop will not turn if you go any shallower." If there was no skeg, then you would trash your prop any time you ran up on some rocks. An outboard skeg is a completely different animal. When you are running your outboard on plane, there is hardly any boat in the water so YES INDEED you need the skeg for STABILITY, not so much for steering. Will flipping, or cuttion the skeg off completely be beneficial? If you ruin a prop you are out at most 55 bucks and 5 minutes of your time. If you get water in the housing or short your motor out then you are looking at 200 bucks plus. Not to mention the downtime while parts are ordered for your motor. Will you have to be more careful to keep from buying props weekly? Yes, there are always tradeoffs. If you are smart enough to run a minn kota, the natural curves of a weedless wedge 2 prop will save your prop as long as you get off of the throttle before you hit bottom as it will turn sideways as you drag it along bottom. With a 3 bladed motorguide prop there is always a chance you would stick a blade and break it right off.

 

[aewrigh]

BTW, might I add the question: Where is the skeg that steers jetboats, airboats, and mud motors? Airboats steer by CHANGING DIRECTION OF THRUST (air via rudders), JET BOATS STEER BY CHANGING THE DIRECTION OF THRUST (water via a nozzle), and MUD MOTORS STEER BY CHANING DIRECTION OF THRUST (water/mud via a prop). Ask a mud motor manufacturer what their skeg is for.....

 

[aewrigh]

Just do it Todd, be our guinea pig