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How's it going everybody? Welcome to Technicians Tuesday. This week we are going to be talking all about trim tabs, why they are important, and how to install them
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For our contest prize, we'll be giving away a Yeti Rambler, so hit that subscribe button and let's get started
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Now, not all boats need trim tabs. And most boats. boats don't need to use them all the time. Trim tabs are used to compensate for changes and
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differences in the weight distribution on the boat, the water current, and the wind conditions
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Sometimes they can get confused between the trim and tilt system that is on the engine, but they
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are not the same thing. I'll put some links in the description to some other videos and articles
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on our website about the differences between the two. Trim tabs are most useful offshore and in
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heavy flowing rivers. This is because of the way that they work. When you put one of the
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of the trim tabs down, it creates drag on one side of the boat and forces the boat to be pulled
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toward the side that the tab is down on. This is because it is creating drag on that side of the
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back of the boat, which is pulling the back of the boat on that side, meaning that it will turn
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the boat in that direction because it is basically sucking that side of the boat down
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and slowing it down. If we put the starboard tab down, the boat will veer to the right. If we
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put the port tab down, it veers to the left. They are used to help keep the boat in a straight heading when we are going into certain winds
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and currents that are pushing the boat to one side or the other
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This is the same for helping to distribute the weight. If we have a bunch of gear or people on one side of the boat, that is going to push that
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side of the boat down into the water, making the boat ride unevenly
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By putting the tab down on that side of the boat, it will lift that side of the boat, getting
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rid of the uneven ride and straightening out the boat so that it steers straight through the water There are two main types of trim tabs either electric or hydraulic and the four most common brands in the U are Linco
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K-plane, or Mercury, Bennett, and boat levelers. Only the Linco trim tabs are completely electric
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The other three are hydraulic. These systems consist of the actual trim tab plane, the trim tab
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actuator, then a control box, and the control pad. Most trim tab systems
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systems now incorporate an auto retract feature. All that does is it automatically pulls
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the trim tabs up whenever the key switch is turned off. This is extremely useful whenever
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your boat is being pulled out of the water by a forklift or you are trailering the
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boat and the trailer bunk comes out under the trim tab. If left in the down position they
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can be broken or bent. There's not really a lot to these systems. The electric trim tabs
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operate by sending power to the actuator to move it up and down
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The hydraulic system on the other hand gets a little more involved
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They have the same planes and there is an actuator, but it's a hydraulic actuator
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Not all hydraulic systems have the auto retract feature, so it's something to be mindful of if you have trim tabs
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Whenever the button on the console is pressed, power is sent to the two relays that are operating an electric motor that runs the hydraulic pump
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that pump then pushes the fluid one way or the other to bring the actuator up or down
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Whereas with the electric system, powers just sent straight to the actuator and it is moved
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up or down by just reversing the polarity of that electricity that is being sent to it
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As far as the failures go, any one of the components on these systems can fail
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We see the rivets here on the planes rust out and the planes fail, sometimes messing up the actuators
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If you catch them quick enough, you can do a quick fix by just drilling out the rivets and putting in stainless steel through bolts with lock nuts to extend the life of the planes We also see the actuators lock up the control pad stop working the indicator lights stop working on the control pad
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then on the hydraulic systems, usually a relay fails from water and moisture and corrosion
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Then if one of the actuators seals, leak, and water is sucked into the system
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then the hydraulic pump itself, or the electric motor will rust and eventually stop working
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These are all extremely common failures, and there isn't really much that can
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be done to avoid them. It's like everything else on a boat though
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It's not if, but when is it going to fail? The best we can do is just periodically keep our eye on them to check for the beginning
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signs of failure. Installing the trim tab system is pretty basic as well though
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We want to get our trim tab planes positioned as far out on the boat as we can
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Sometimes you can't get them all the way out to the sides, which is completely fine
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They're going to work fine being moved in a little bit. We are putting these inward toward the keel on the Ocean Master because we want to have the wires under the deck and not running along the back of the boat
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It's important to get as much surface area as we can along the bottom of the boat
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Having the trim tab on the strake will lose some performance but not really enough to notice
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You also want to make sure when the trim tab is fully retracted that it is not sticking down past the bottom of the hull
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creating unwanted drag on the boat. Once we find the position we want, we'll turn it
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Trace out the planes, mark the screw holes, and drill out the pilot holes
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Then we'll cover each hole and run a bead of sealant all the way around where the plane is going to get screwed on
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And then we'll screw the plane into place. We will want to take some cheap degreaser and a rag to clean up all of the
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excess sealant that smushes out once the plane is screwed in place That way it comes out looking really clean We will do the same thing for the actuator bracket on the top
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We'll position it to be under the deck, we'll trace it out and then drill out the screw holes
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as well as drill out a hole that we will feed the wire through to the other side
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After we get everything drilled out, we can seal everything up and we can feed the wire through the transom
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and then screw the bracket to the boat. It's good to circle the wire with sealant for the last 10 inches or so of the wire as you push it in to make sure that the sealant goes all the way through the transom
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Now it's just a matter of hooking up the wiring. Before we go over the wiring though
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For these wires, the control pad is just plug and play. This is also the old style from Lenko
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The new style is all incorporated as far as the control pad and the auto retracting box goes
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We have this orange wire here, and that is for the auto retract system
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If you watch the video on the Verado rigging, the accessory wire coming from the key switch is where this orange
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orange wire is going to hook up to. It will always hook up to the key on power, which may vary
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a little bit depending on what engines you have, but I've got it hooked straight up to power
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coming in on this pad because I've been using this as a test box. We just have 12-volt power
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and a ground coming into it. Then for the wires going back to the actuators, there are red stripes
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for the wires that go to the port actuator, then there are green stripes on the wires that go to
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the starboard actuator. And that's it. Now you're going to the wire. you know all about trim tab systems and how they operate. Don't forget to smash that like
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button and we'll see you next week
