cart7t

I still say the Cat style hull would REALLY turn some heads. 8-)

On any older fiberglass used boat the 3 biggest things to look out for are rot in the floor and transom on the boat and the mechanical condition of the engine. Things like the trailer and external stuff like electronics, gauges, carpeting, seating, etc. can be seen visually upon inspection but the first 3 are possible hidden defects. Flooring - Walk around on the floor of the boat as well as the decks but primarily the floor. If you're finding soft spots you've got a rotten floor. Excessive soft spots and you've got a boat that's not been cared for. This could also indicate rot in the structural stringer system of the boat as well, not a do-it-yourself project for the faint-at-heart. If it's merely a small area 1' across or so that can be cut out and replaced with a minimal amount of work. Transom - This is a biggie. Rotted wood transoms are probably more common than most people know. Get a buddy to go along with you to help find this. First look for the visual clues. Cracks in the splashwell corners, engine mounting bolts that appear sunk into the transom, rust stains eminating from the mounting bolt holes or from anything mounted to the transom. I can knock the transom with my knuckles and listen for the sound. It sould sound solid, anything sounding even slightly hollow is an indication of a soft, water logged transom. Lastly, have a buddy stand on the cavitation plate of the motor and put his weight into it bouncing it up and down while you observe the transom. You should see no flexing of the fiberglass AT ALL. Transoms can be repaired as a do it yourself project. Its pretty labor intensive, mostly getting the old rotted wood out. Using the seacast system, which is the easiest, it'll cost around $400-600 depending on the size of the transom, redoing it with wood is cheaper but more difficult. Engine - Don't just run it on the muffs hooked to a hose. You need to get the boat on the water and run it for awhile. Have a compression test done. The cylinder compression in all cylinders should be within 10% of each other. Hope this helps.

I'm still not sure why you're holding onto the extreme V hull design. Yes, it's gonna look like a modern day bass boat but the hull design itself is the way it is due to the picture you just posted and no other reason. For fishing stability, a V hull has little functionality. In fact, because of the V, you're losing valuable deck room not to mention potential storage space.

Hmmm.... Looks like a typical summer weekend on Lake of the Ozarks.

There ya go. It has a V with sponsons. Get rid of the open area and you've got a little mini-aircraft carrier. ;D

Some of the best deals I've seen on new boats were either brand new but 2 model years old boats or a boat ordered by a customer, then delivered but the deal fell through and the dealer was stuck with it. In both cases you have no choice in colors or many other features of the boat but they went for a song.

I just don't have the constitution anymore to spend an entire day on the water. I love fishing an hour or 2 just before dawn. Starting at around 4am. I'll usually fish up until 8-9am. Then it's back to the cabin for breakfast and shuteye. Back out after a couple hour nap for the midday bite. Fish from around Noon till 2-3pm. Go into town after that, lay around, maybe catch a lite lunch, nap again, prep steaks for the evening grill Then go back out around 6pm till around 9 or 10. Late evening dinner, an hour or two of drinking and BS followed by sleep. Then start it all over again the next day. This is what I imagine Heaven is going to be like, I just won't get tired. ;D

I just checked my states requirements. If the boat is 12' and over it must be registered. If you attempt to get the registration you have to have the hull ID number. If the hull ID is missing or if it's a homemade boat you have to apply for a hull ID number with the state by filling out a form. I didn't check the form but I'm sure stuff like length, width, transom height, hull construction material, etc is on there.

I suppose the decrease-increase-decrease in fuel need by the engine could've caused a air-lock in the line if the pump wasnt' pumping up to snuff.

I wouldn't mess with a freshwater boat if you're planning on running in salt, even if it's merely brackish. The amount of cleaning time after a SW excursion may exceed the amount of time you spent on the water that day. Seriously, you'd have to hook the motor up to the muffs and thoroughly flush it out. Thorough hose down of the boat and trailer (if it's not galvanized), trolling motor(if it's not a SW TM), interior of boat (better not have carpet), etc. and I'm still positive you won't get it all cleaned if you took any spray over the side during the day. It's not worth it.

Think bigger than that. Design it for stability at rest for 2 people, even if it is a 12 footer. You just never know. Imagine taking orders at the boat ramp. Some unknown guy named Forrest Wood got started that way.

OK Russ, here's another idea you can chew on. I suggested this earlier. A cat hull bass boat. This one is the Fast Cat bass boat.

Here's where the problem comes in with what you're wanting to do. You say you want to take this (my boat): and shrink it down. First you need to realize why my boat is designed the way it is. V hull bass boats were built to provide the best possible high-speed ride in a variety of water conditions while not compromising the fishermen a stable fishing platform at rest. The boat designers accomplished this by pushing the boat width out wide enough and using the internal ballast (weight of the sucker, ie: fiberglass, hull structural members, gas tank). My boat is a 1986 Champion 184DC. The beam is 86". Champion built this boat in response to the Skeeter Wrangler, the first true V hull bass boat. The Champion 86" hull was actually a modified HydroStream Performance boat hull redesigned for bass fishing applications. The thing rides like a dream, one of the easiest and best performing bass boat hulls ever BUT some people don't like them because of their tendency to roll if both anglers are on one side of the boat. I wouldn't call it tippiness, it's not that severe, it's just a nuance of the hull you have to get used to and a tradeoff for the great ride. Other Vhull designers have flattened out their hulls, like Ranger, which gives you a much more stable at rest platform but the big water ride suffers. The point I'm getting at is this. The V hull is probably the worst design for a bass fishing boat if the need for a smooth ride in big water isn't needed. In fact, it's the worst design and in your case with what you're wanting to do, probably not possible because you're wanting to remove the ballast of the hull which is part of what makes it stable to begin with. Here, I think, is probably a better idea if your wanting some semblance to a Vhull bassboat but still have the fishing stability: This Cajun (it doesn't matter the brand, all the manufacturers were making these) was the second revolution in bass boat design. It was an attempt at a Vhull bass boat. Notice the V slicing from the front to back but notice something else? Those side sponsons that ran up both sides of the hull. These particular boats were around 74-78" wide, at least 10" wider than the previous old bathtub style, cathedral hull bass boats. The designers though, felt that a true V that wide would be too tippy so they added those side sponsons to provide stability at rest. Were these boats stable? You bet. Did they give a true, smooth, Vhull ride in rough water? Well, no. They were far better than the old bathtub style boats but those sponsons prevented the V from slicing through the waves. If you were going to lighten the ballast of the bottom of the hull, I'd think this would be a better design if you're wanting to try and keep the thing looking like a mini-bassboat. Granted, adding the sponsons will increase the surface area of the glass and thus increase the weight of the boat hull but without them (sponsons), I'm afraid you're lightweight mini V hull would be tippy as all get out.

Aside from all the stock tank jabs that Bill gets here and elsewhere, he's one of the best and most informative teachers on many of the fundamental fishing techniques in bass fishing there is along with giving some very informative and easy to understand advice on structure fishing for bass and the hows and whys of bass movement. $275 does seem a little pricey though.

That's only if the male even bothers to use a fork.

I've had both and I'll never go back to MG. They just don't hold up.

Since it's rated for a 25hp, I'd go with a 20. You should do just fine.

Why not just make a cat type boat with your choice of lightweight material (aluminum or plywood) spanning the 2 cat sponsons. The sponsons themselves could be extremely thin walled with the compartments built into them for batterys, tackle and rod storage. I'd probably make a battery compartment in both the front and rear of each cat sponson for a battery. The rest of the thing is yours to decide how you want to lay it out. I'm sure you could get by with some of that composite boat material that Cabela's sells by the sheet to use for bulkheads in the sponsons. fill the rest of it up with foam. This would certainly settle any tipping problems, cat hulls are extremely stable at rest.

I'm no boat design expert but here's a thought. A normal bassboats stability at rest when fishing is due in large part to the hull width along with the amount of ballast,(ie-fiberglass hull, plus the weight of the reinforcing structural members along with the gas tank. If you minimize that ballast weight you'll have to have something to provide weight at the bottom of the boat to overcome the top heaviness of the fishermen and trolling motors on the elevated casting decks. Since you don't want to add structural members which add weight, I just don't know how stable a fiberglass shell would be. In other words, if you took a big piece of 12" thick styrofoam, say 6' x 6' and stood on it in the water you'd probably be OK until you started moving around towards the outside edges. Then the whole thing would want to tip over. Now strap some weigts to the bottom of the foam and the thing becomes more stable because the weight on top of the foam doesnt' overcome the weight on the bottom. Just a thought.

You need to get this boat on the water and run it. Tritons are known to be a little difficult to run at WOT, especially if you have little to no experience running a high performance bassboat. I'd suggest taking an experienced boater with you for a test run to run the boat for you so you can see whether you can handle it or not. That boat is perfectly capable of 70+ mph on the water but that can be dangerous in the hands of someone inexperienced especially in a boat that requires experienced attention to drive at higher speeds.

ESPN2 had one of those bass fishing shows on this morning that gave a pretty good synopsis of the history of the bassboat. The timeline was pretty close to what I stated earlier in the thread. Most of your creature features that became standard on all bassboats, rod boxes, aereated livewells, storage boxes, raised casting decks, pedestals with fishing seats were all in place by the very early 70's. It's been hull design, engine horsepower (led by the Mercury Black Max 175hp in 1975), trolling motors and hull construction techniques and materials that have changed the most.

Just out of curiosity, do you currently own a boat and what kind is it?

Junebug Black Neon Electric Red Shad Motor Oil Pumpkin/Chartreuse tail Black Neon/Chartreuse tail Old Lucky Strike color called Natural Shell. Moccasin/Blue flake Old Ditto Gatortail color called Pumpkin/Chartreuse Glitter

I'm an old Southern Sproat user. They're getting very hard to find, everyone is pushing the offsets. Looks like I'm going to have to special order in large quantities.

Here's a trick the guys use at Lake of the Ozarks when the bass are suspending under the floats in the middle of the docks and nearly impossible to get at. Stay about 5 - 10 yards off one end of the dock and cast down that side towards shore. Heavier spinnerbaits work great for this. Now stick your rod in the water and have the spool release on. begin moving the towards the other end of the dock allowing the line to free spool out, you don't want the lure to move just yet. When you get there, begin your retrieve. You'll now be bringing that bait from one end ot the dock to the other up underneath. You're not only retrieving your bait in a manner the fish aren't used to seeing but you're reaching fish that aren't reachable using any other bait presentation. White jigs with a split tail trailer work good for this as well, you swim them back. Note, this works as long as there is no outside edge dock anchoring system.