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In hind sight , this should have been posted in Boats and Motors perhaps ?
If so my apologies....
I have a "Sea Nymph" , "Fishing Machine" (essentially a 17 foot aluminum bass boat).
Id like to add a kicker motor for trolling rather that relying on my primary outboard or the electric motor up front. My question is, does anyone have any thoughts or experience with how big a motor (in horse pwr) would be enough/to much ?
Appreciate the thoughts and expertise of the board.
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How fast do you want to be able to go?
How are you planning on mounting the kicker?
How will you control the kicker (remote throttle and steering, tie-rod connected to main engine)?
Do you currently premix or just put straight gas in the tank?
Example: my boat is a heavy fiberglass 19ft boat and the kicker is a 9.9 merc 4 stroke. Top speed with kicker only is about 5.5 mph. Lowest speed at idle is 1.2mph
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thanks for responding
I looked at a number of past posts made in the Boats and Motors board (realized it was there after I posted)
In a nut shell, I believe I want to go with a 4 stroke and usually target between 1 - 3 mph while trolling. Based on what Ive read , seems something in the 4 to 6 hp range might be the sweet spot.
Appreciate every ones thoughts and experiences.
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I have a 15.5' glass boat and a 9.9 hp Yamaha four stroke and it will troll from 1.0 to 5.5 mph ish.... Love the four stroke and don't mind having a little extra speed in the kicker in case the old merc decides to go on the blink.... or your fighting wind and waves and still trying to fish... Mileage is incredible on the small motor, but it is a little heavier than a smaller motor... So that's a trade off you'll have to decide which works best for you... Good luck... J
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I would add have you thought about getting the kicker with hydraulic tilt. Kinda nice as you get older. The Merc 9.9 Pro Kicker can be set up with tilt on the throttle control, electric start on your dash and be permanently tied to your main motor for steering. It also has an alternator built in so the whole time you are trolling the batteries are being charged, a plus with electric downriggers. That is how my 18.5 Lund is set up. Will troll below 1 MPH and still move you off the lake in an emergency. With that said my last boat had a 4 HP Yamaha 4 stroke and it was a jewel.The steering had a link to the big motor you had to hook up when you tilted it down and remove before you tilted up, no big deal. The throttle had to be set at the tiller and that was kind of a pain to maintain trolling speed. You had to reach back into the transom to adjust it every time you turned from into the wind to with the wind etc.. I really like having the throttle control right at my hands sitting at my downrigger with the new boat. My .02
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I have a 18 foot aluminum boat and I have a 6 hp 4 stroke on it. It will go to 1 mph, I have the steering hooked up to my big motor, it works out pretty good.
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I had a 2.5 merc. as a kicker on a 17 ft glass center console it was enough to troll up to 2.6 mph. And troll for 4 hours on a quart of premix. Had it linked to my 75 hp merc. For steering, now I run a 8 hp. Yamaha four stroke, linked to my 150 for steering (hydraulic) I put a troll master throttle control on it and I would never go back to a cable type throttle control, it will adjust in tenths of mph, the Yamaha is very quiet, and will troll at .8 and up to 5.5 pushing a 21 ft aluminum boat, the 8 horse in most brands of motors are twins so they run smoother, than the 6 and less models, but the small motors are lighter so that's a plus for them. a friend of mine put a 15 hp four stroke on a 20 ft center console and the weight made it very hard to not start proposing , he wished he had gone smaller, just more stuff to consider.....
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Do yourself a favor and buy a Suzuki.
Electronic fuel injection so no stupid choke and a rock solid reputation.
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I have a 20' Hewescraft with a Mercury 115EFI with the Troll Control tach. I can increase or decrease my RPMs in 10 RPM increments between 550 RPM and 1000 RPM. I can get as slow as 2.4 MPH in this way. I recently have been getting into kokanee fishing and wanted to figure out a way to go slower. I found some info on a walleye forum about using trolling socks, so. bought two 18" socks and a couple of carabiners, and already had a dock line. I rigged the whole thing up so that when I tie the line off to my bow rails, with the line going under the boat, the carabiners are level with the chine. I can now get down to 1.4 MPH. My engine is very quiet at 550 RPM, it burns 0.2-0.3 GPH. The whole setup cost $40, is very light, cheap to run, and doesn't interfere with fishing, steering, etc.
Here are a couple of photos.
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Single main, no kicker. 
