ride plates?

Do ride plates make a big difference in speed or performance? Why would they make a difference? Is it because it creates less drag? How much speed could a i pick up on a 20' jet boat. thanx
mach1 454

Ride plates are set up so you can fly the boat on the plate and not really have much of the boat in the water. Less drag yes. You need to have a split bowl or have yours tapped like HBJets. I am sure he can show you a picture if you don't know what I mean. It takes some time to get them set up right. If you have a place this helps to. Good luck

I can see from picture how it bolts on to the bowl. But, how is it connected to the hull? Is it merely bolted to the bottom of the hull? What is typical for size and thickness of a ride plate?

Actually Hitechperformance.com has a ride plate that will work for your C bowl if that is in fact what you have.

I raise my rideplate last week trying to get more speed. It did more harm than good. It cause problems with steering. I think I raised it to much which allowed water to hit the nozzle wrong causing my boat to become hard to steer with my place diverter on the lowest two settings. It was also really hard to raise the diverter. Once I raised the diverter to about the 3rd or 4th setting, it became easy to move and easy to steer like normal. I just finished lowering it down some. Its about 1/4 inch higher than it been set for the past two years since I bought it. I will see what happens Saturday.