nothched or pocket hulls and motor height

Hi all, first post here and I'm hoping you can clear up some confusion for me.

I have a 1992 20' nitro bass boat with a notched hull and a 200XP evinrude with a manual jackplate. My confusion is that I read that the anti venting plate should be about 1/2" ABOVE the bottom of the hull with the motor level. What I need to know is do I treat the bottom of the hull as the bottom of the hull, or do I treat the top of the transom notch as the bottom of the hull?

I'm sure I have way too much motor in the water as the boat really doesn't want to plane and the top RPM is only 4200 regardless of weather I use a 21 or a 17 prop.

Forgive my ignorance on this subject, but this is my first bass boat and it seems that this subject is an art/science in itself.

Any additional infor you guys could provide taht you think useful would be greatly appriciated!

 

Since you have a jack plate, simply run the boat with the plate progressively higher untill the prop blows out, then lower it a bit. Make sure to do this in a decent chop so you have good all around performance, unless you like fiddling with the manual plate As far as RPM and planing, does trimming the motor up help any? Sounds like it's tucked in too far, or too much prop, or both.

 

I've seen Nitro's set up with the vent plate at the step. May be a good place to start and then adjust up or down in accordance with the previous reply. In fact I'm looking at a Nitro right now with a 225 and a 10" jack plate and the vent plate is slightly above the step. Hope this helps.