Vac-U-Boat's 1-3/4" 4-Blade 2-Piece Plastic Prop
| Dumas 1-3/4" Plastic prop for a 1/8" shaft. This is the stock Vac-U-Tug Jr. Prop. |  |
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| To make your own, just take two of them and bore away the front half of the hub on one and the back half of the hub on the other. (I had to machine a special drill for this task to have flat matching surfaces.) There is still lots of Plastic to support the propeller blades if used with the tug's stock motor. |  |
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| Push the two halves together with the blades 90 degrees apart. When installing, screw the prop and the drive dog together onto the shaft. Hold the rear-most blades steady while tightening the prop nut to keep them from being turned. The force of the prop nut will keep the two halves aligned. |  |
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| The finished prop is a little odd looking but works well. This may be the power I need to take an ODOM and turn it in either direction when pushing from the side stay. I'll let you know soon. |  |
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| Here is the mounted prop. It is not bad
looking. Actually it has a turbine appearance like some modern fast
military craft. I'm tempted to put a Kort Nozzle around it to see what
happens.
With both boats on 6 cells, it barely out pushed (head to head) and was a little faster in a race than the Dumas bronze 3 blade. With 6 cells against a stock 2 blade prop with 7 cells, it equaled the 7 cell tug head to head and was a tiny bit faster in a race. With 7 cells, this prop was awesome. It didn't greatly overpower the hull but had lots of reserve for towing. Test data to follow. (For a year, I thought these were nylon props. Only after buying nylon adhesive, which failed, I now think that they are high density polyethylene (HDPE) plastic like gallon milk jugs are made from.) Since they are polyethylene plastic, the two pieces cannot be glued together. These two-piece 4-blade plastic props are available on the Prices Lists for Kits & Accessories page for $4.00. Or, get out the drill press and try to make one yourself!
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