Go Surf Assist install

Great write-up.  Looks like a well executed install.   I really love that launch feature of the GSA.  I haven’t been able to try one or test it but your description is money for wake boarding.    

Solid.  

Agree with above....Great write up. The pics of hose angles are helpful.  Timbrr loves his GSA on his Malibu I’m sure I would too and was a toss up between that or custom gates.  Thanks for posting.

15 minutes ago, Number9 said:

Great write-up.  Looks like a well executed install.   I really love that launch feature of the GSA.  I haven’t been able to try one or test it but your description is money for wake boarding.    

Thank you.  I think it could be a game changer for my boat with the base power plant at elevation. 

12 minutes ago, Rugger said:

Agree with above....Great write up. The pics of hose angles are helpful.  Timbrr loves his GSA on his Malibu I’m sure I would too and was a toss up between that or custom gates.  Thanks for posting.

Hope I can help someone else researching or on the fence.  I will not comitt to loving it until I surf it but so far I think it was money well spent.

Update:  Now that we have been able to ride and tweek the GSA wave, i thought I would report our experiences.  A bit of weight adjustments were necessary to accommodate for the new system vs. the suckgate.  Once dialed we were blown away with wave shape, height, length and push at the back of the wave.  My average size riders were riding the pocket about 15 ft back and recovering from the wash approx. 20 ft back on skim boards! The fat guys like me, lol, were on the brakes way back in the curl! I had to adjust my normal stance back a bit on the board to get off the brakes.  Wave on port side had that curl and lip I've always been envious of on the goofy side! GSA, Imho, is superior in every way to the suckgate we ran last season.  Here is our ballast setup.

Bow ballast approx 500 lbs: approx 350 in plumbed bag under seat and 150 lbs crew.

Midship approx 500 to 600 lbs in plumbed bag under floor in place of hard tank.

Cabin approx 1000 lbs in crew, gear and 300 plumbed bag under coffin seat for slight list to surf side.

Rear approx 2600 lbs: 750s, hard tanks, 200 lead placed under bags, simulated wedge weight.

Note:  We also had another 300 in lead to move around depending on surf side and crew seating to dial in the wave.

GSA was dialed to surf setting for port and skim for goofy.  Bow rise was noticably less than last season with a suckgate.  Most riders preferred this setup for each side.  A couple less experienced riders preferred the GSA set to skim on port side for more mellow transition and height, which brought the bow even more.  I love being able to make these adjustments at the push of a button!

Nice!   A whole lotta love for GSA out there, sounds like for good reason.  

Curious... maybe you can throw the suck gate on too... just to see if both do anything together.   Before and after.

16 minutes ago, ryan said:

Nice!   A whole lotta love for GSA out there, sounds like for good reason.  

Curious... maybe you can throw the suck gate on too... just to see if both do anything together.   Before and after.

Its definitely memorial day weekend as the weather has come in.  If we get a break, we plan to get some time on the water.  I'll throw it on and see what happens.  Ultimately these devices and systems are just delaying water convergence.  Not sure what doubling up will do, but cant hurt to experiment...lol.  I'll let you know!

Bovhica, great write up and great install. We were at lucky until 10 last night after work. The weather has been off for is and theres another cold front on the way in. Will be rolling a lime green and grey Tige r23 this summer. Come flag us down if you see us at lucky. We are mostly midweek evenings and occasionally buzz up on Sunday but wont get up there until 530-6

8 hours ago, freeheel4life said:

Bovhica, great write up and great install. We were at lucky until 10 last night after work. The weather has been off for is and theres another cold front on the way in. Will be rolling a lime green and grey Tige r23 this summer. Come flag us down if you see us at lucky. We are mostly midweek evenings and occasionally buzz up on Sunday but wont get up there until 530-6

Likewise, flag us down if you see us!  Haven't been to lucky other than to test the system early in april.  We've been at lowell quite a bit.  Water temp was 75 last time we were out over the weekend.  What's the water temp at lucky? 

Didnt bother looking at the water temp.  Everyone rode no tops or suits and we surfed until about 930. Air temp was 92 on the way up there.  I will snag a pic of our shop boat, though I'm often out on other boats too. Will keep any eye out man!!

Great write up! We finally committed and bought the system yesterday. 

On 6/14/2020 at 11:18 AM, GloverT said:

Great write up! We finally committed and bought the system yesterday. 

When you receive the system is there any chance you would take measurements of the tabs? 

I’m looking to duplicate the GSA tabs and use the controller documented here in other threads. 

Thank you for this post & pics... just started install for an ‘05 VLX (same hull as yours), and your tip on hacking the hinges saved me wasted time waiting for support to reply 

6 hours ago, Landho said:

Thank you for this post & pics... just started install for an ‘05 VLX (same hull as yours), and your tip on hacking the hinges saved me wasted time waiting for support to reply 

Glad it helped! Once you get it dialed, you will wonder how you lived without it!

Dialing will be different than using a suckgate.  GSA likes lots of weight in the rear. Without making proper adjustments, you will likely be disappointed.  I upgraded to 1000s in the rear.  Here's our current setup after a couple seasons dialing and perfecting the wave.

Rear: 2400 tanks and bags + floating wedge, 150 lead in vdrive tray under middle seat. 50 lead under each port and starboard rear seats. Fyi....We also will drain non surf side hard tank to clean up wave sometimes.

Mid: plmbed 300 bag under port coffin seat for slight list to surf side, 50 lead in observer compatment, 500 to 600 plumbed bag in place of mid hard tank (my boat only has rear factory tanks) mid bag is a 650, but actual weight is my best guess.

Front approx 300 to 400 bag under modified playpen seat, 200 lead stuffed in the nose.

1st Picture of skim setting. Rider is on skim board and way back! He's about 5'9" and 175 lbs for reference. 

2nd photo is of same rider at surf setting. I know camera angle is different but wave does change significantly. 

Thanks!  That’s a lot of weight... we’re hoping to not have to put as much weight up front with the GSA.  Currently we have stock rear, center tanks  -  700 piggy backs integrated in each rear corner (I have ordered 810 from wake makers) , a 300 plug and fill under front seat, and two additional 400’s we can move around. Plus dual 1100 cca batteries, three amps, subs, and usually 5 or more ppl.

Which prop do you run for that setup?

5 hours ago, Landho said:

Thanks!  That’s a lot of weight... we’re hoping to not have to put as much weight up front with the GSA.  Currently we have stock rear, center tanks  -  700 piggy backs integrated in each rear corner (I have ordered 810 from wake makers) , a 300 plug and fill under front seat, and two additional 400’s we can move around. Plus dual 1100 cca batteries, three amps, subs, and usually 5 or more ppl.

Which prop do you run for that setup?

Your weight should be good! You can always have someone sit up front if you need it.  I'm slammed and we love the wave slammed, but the key will be your ratio.  GSA needs more in rear and less up front than suckgate.  You will just have to dial it to your liking. Sounds like you know what you're doing!  Post some pics! 

I run the Acme 2419 with the Lcr 5.7 base motor.  At 2500 to 3000 ft we have no problem pushing the weight at 11 mph.  If I reduce front weight it struggles a bit. If crew is more than 5 or 6, I need to put people in the bow. All my ballast is under seat or hidden which frees up seating.  I used to need my bow bag (sumo 750) full and on top of bow seat when we ran a suckgate.  Now it's under my modified seat which gives us room for bigger crew up there with some lead to supplement. I like my wave with crew of 4 to 6.  Love it with 8 to 10!

@Bovhica Just curious....Do you know what actuators got used?? XD 101s?? Or XD102s

27 minutes ago, freeheel4life said:

@Bovhica Just curious....Do you know what actuators got used?? XD 101s?? Or XD102s

Not sure.  I purchased a spare, just in case. I have the box in my garage.  I will try to remember to look this evening  and let you know.

1 hour ago, freeheel4life said:

@Bovhica Just curious....Do you know what actuators got used?? XD 101s?? Or XD102s

My kit came with 101XDS...

I'm having hell getting things setup to my liking on this '05 VLX hull - really wish I had gotten (and used) the spacer instead of trimming the hinge.  I'm sure once I get the mounting locations dialed in i'll progress quicker - I need another set of hands to help (the tabs are bulky/heavy), so going to pause for now until my son can come help.

33 minutes ago, Landho said:

My kit came with 101XDS...

I'm having hell getting things setup to my liking on this '05 VLX hull - really wish I had gotten (and used) the spacer instead of trimming the hinge.  I'm sure once I get the mounting locations dialed in i'll progress quicker - I need another set of hands to help (the tabs are bulky/heavy), so going to pause for now until my son can come help.

 

Grab some rope and tie to tab to the lifting eyes on each side. That's how I got mine setup. Finding the actuator mount position is the hardest part of the whole thing haha

That install was less than fun - I got lucky and I need my driver side panel remounted anyways - so I installed the switch right where the mount is to hide the temp fix.

i measures 90 times and cut/mounted once - but my starboard side is still a bit lower and about 1/2” out of the swim deck ... port side is exactly where I wanted it.  My tabs seem to extend further than OP, but maybe I don’t have them tucked up far enough.

The control panel required some righteous holes - and a mess - putting them where I did I had to drill three 1.25” holes and a 3/8” hole into the fiberglass behind the drivers side panel, what a mess!!!!  I appreciate the beefiness if everything - but believe there could be some improvement to the scale of those connectors to give more install location flexibility.  Pigtails off the control panel instead of plugs into the control panel would have also be 10X more easier 

The blue tooth app doesn’t work for Jack, I’d love if it did.
 

water test tomorrow but won’t have all ballast done tomorrow - so will be a mini test 

On 5/25/2019 at 10:41 AM, Bovhica said:

Update:  Now that we have been able to ride and tweek the GSA wave, i thought I would report our experiences.  A bit of weight adjustments were necessary to accommodate for the new system vs. the suckgate.  Once dialed we were blown away with wave shape, height, length and push at the back of the wave.  My average size riders were riding the pocket about 15 ft back and recovering from the wash approx. 20 ft back on skim boards! The fat guys like me, lol, were on the brakes way back in the curl! I had to adjust my normal stance back a bit on the board to get off the brakes.  Wave on port side had that curl and lip I've always been envious of on the goofy side! GSA, Imho, is superior in every way to the suckgate we ran last season.  Here is our ballast setup.

Bow ballast approx 500 lbs: approx 350 in plumbed bag under seat and 150 lbs crew.

Midship approx 500 to 600 lbs in plumbed bag under floor in place of hard tank.

Cabin approx 1000 lbs in crew, gear and 300 plumbed bag under coffin seat for slight list to surf side.

Rear approx 2600 lbs: 750s, hard tanks, 200 lead placed under bags, simulated wedge weight.

Note:  We also had another 300 in lead to move around depending on surf side and crew seating to dial in the wave.

GSA was dialed to surf setting for port and skim for goofy.  Bow rise was noticably less than last season with a suckgate.  Most riders preferred this setup for each side.  A couple less experienced riders preferred the GSA set to skim on port side for more mellow transition and height, which brought the bow even more.  I love being able to make these adjustments at the push of a button!

Nice write up!  And I agree they rock I have installed 2 sets of these myself.

One on an 2005 Mastercraft x-star and another on a 2010 Malibu Wakesetter 23 LSV.

I am Curious how much dealer charged to install?

I don't remember exact cost of install.  I had the dealer install some tower lights and change my vdrive fluid as well.  All that included was about $500 during winter months when dealer was offering a deal on shop labor.

Looks cool seeing the two boats with Go Surf Assist on there side by side.

Any chance you could get me dimensions on these gsa tabs looking to recreate the exact tabs and not have to use a gsa system. Thanks

16 hours ago, Devon Murray said:

Any chance you could get me dimensions on these gsa tabs looking to recreate the exact tabs and not have to use a gsa system. Thanks

That's not what we look to do here on this site.  

1 hour ago, Rugger said:

That's not what we look to do here on this site.  

 So this isn't a DIY site? This isn't a site were people come together and find solutions to making our expensive hobby as affordable as possible? I like the GSA tabs just not the controller. and at 2k for the tabs I find that a huge markup. as i have found guys that will make them for 1k they just need measurements.

7 hours ago, Devon Murray said:

 So this isn't a DIY site? This isn't a site were people come together and find solutions to making our expensive hobby as affordable as possible? I like the GSA tabs just not the controller. and at 2k for the tabs I find that a huge markup. as i have found guys that will make them for 1k they just need measurements.

Yes to everything above.  And there are some insanely great innovations and collaboration here, sometimes better than what you can buy.  But we try to steer away from posting exact dimensions or cad drawings of products that others work hard to produce if that makes sense.  Your best bet is to go to a dealer with a tape measure.  All good my friend, and welcome to the site.