Tpayneful

Zoom finesse worm outfishes them all in the secret color.

Fish for dollars is correct..... Buy the boat in the fall or winter and you will get your best deal. You will pay thousands more in the spring. Go to Evinirude, Mercury and Yamaha's website and look at the performance bulletins for the outboard and boat that you are considering. You will be surprised about boat size, outboard size and horsepower. My Stratos 294XL Evo (19' 6") boat with a 200 HO Evinrude Etec gets the same gas mileage at 55MPH that the 285XL (18' 6") boat with a 150 HO Etec gets at 25MPH. 25MPH is where the 285XL gets its best gas mileage of 4.1 MPG. I spend a lot more time going 55 than I do 25. I seriously considered gas mileage when I made my purchase because I will not forget $4 a gallon gas prices.

I would not suggest using dialectric grease unless you have a sealed compartment to put your plug in while not in use. The grease will collect dirt and sand in the plug holes and make them difficult to use. Reese has little boxes that you can screw into your bumper to protect the plug when not in use if you use the grease.

I just put my second gallon of oil in the boat last week. I have a 2009 Evinrude Etec 200 HO. It doesn't use a lot of oil or as much gas as smaller engines on smaller boats. The XD100 oil is $59.99 a gallon so I have spent $120 this year on oil.

The maxxum has infinite variable speed as well as the maximizer. The maxxum has a speed dial that goes from 0 to 100 and you can adjust the dial to be anywhere in that range. The Edge has 5 fixed speeds. The digital maximizer pulses the voltage / current to the motor which allows the motor to run significantly longer than the steady current provided to the Edge motor. I can run my maxxum 70 all day in the wind on Deka batteries on my 19'8" Stratos. My partner can only get 5 hours of use out of his 70 Edge on the same size Deka batteries on a 18'6" Skeeter. We have run his batteries dead multiple times but never have run mine dead. They both have composite shafts but the Maxxum has a spring in the front that absorbs impacts. The Edge is just clamped to the mount. The Maxxum has a better mount that deploys easier. The Edge will bind easily which causes broken pull ropes. I have experience with both and had them upgrade my trolling motor to the maxxum when I bought my boat last fall. It was money well spent.

Your automobile insurance should cover what you tow. Check your poilcy. You are welcome.

If you finance the boat through a bank they will require boat insurance. If you paid cash, no boat insurance is required in Virginia. It is a cheep and wise protection. A boat traveling 30+MPH can easily kill someone. A deputy in Spotsylvania fell out of the boat when they crossed a huge wake with the police boat on Lake Anna. The second deputy fell, hit his head but stayed in the boat. He later died at the hospital. My old 15' 6" 1980 Skeeter with a 70 HP insurance cost $80 a year for liability. My 2009 Stratos 294XLE with a 200 HP costs $350 for full coverage. I have all my insurance with Allstate. Both my bank and my HOA require insurance. I live in a community with a private lake and they will not let you put your boat on the water without proof of insurance.

I like the boat but that boat and motor combination will EAT gas. A Stratos 294XL with an Etec will get better gas mileage (4.1 MPG) at 56 MPH than the 285XL will get at its best RPM which is at 35MPH (3.74 MPG). Go to the Yamaha website and look at the performance tests. At 57 MPH the Yamaha gets 2.86 MPG. Here is the link: http://www.yamaha-motor.com/assets/products/otb/bulletins/bulletin_2stroke_vmax_pro_str-285proxl-v150tlr.pdf

Mine

I have heard that but not seen it happen. I will hear that kind of racket in my driveway.

Someone in the back of the boat did that to my passenger seat. I am looking at vinyl repair kits. I am thinking about buying the permatex pro repair kit. It comes with an iron. http://www.amazon.com/Permatex-Style-Vinyl-Leather-Repair/dp/B0007TQWK6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=automotive&qid=1277075651&sr=8-1

Palomar won knot wars last year on everything. It works for me, have not had a reason to change.

Mine dried up too. Have a new bottle that I have never opened. Hope it doesn't do the same thing....

It is a Ford / Chevy thing but having used both motors, I recommend a Minnkota because I like the foot pedal better and the composite shaft takes more of a beating than the stainless steel shaft of the Motorguide. If you do break one, replacement shafts are less than $20. My first bow mounted trolling motor was an old cable steer motorguide. I replaced it with a Minnkota Powerdrive. I shortened the cable, shortened the shaft and ran the depthfinder cable through the shaft and mounted the transducer on the bottom of the motor. I fished the boat everywhere. I fished the stump fields of Stick Marsh in wind and survived. The power drive motors are slower to turn but bass fishing isn't racing at Infinion Raceway road course. Anticipate where you are going and you will be fine 99% of the time. I would really have liked to have one with an i-pilot. I can see where that would be really nice to have! My new boat has a Minnkota Maxxum 70. It is cable steer and a really good motor. It is a digital pulse motor and it runs all day on two batteries in the wind. My partners Edge 70 will not with the same batteries. So my recommendation is to buy a Minnkota digital motor. I think you will be fine with either a Power drive or cable steer. Good luck and enjoy your trolling motor choice!

I have a front gate at our community that requires all boat trailers to stop and be checked out. We also have a securtiy dvr that records every vehicle as it leaves. It is lighted and records license plates. If they run the gate we have the video of the tow vehicle. I have a hitch lock installed. The thing that really worries me is kids breaking into my storage compartments. I probably need to install Lock r bars on the front and back decks.....

Down imaging is not available on the 788. I would agree that down imaging is not a deal maker. You have to be right over the object to figure out what it is. You can easily see what it is with Side Imaging. Side Imaging is a deal maker.

I have a water proof orange box with pliers, dikes, screw drivers, wrenches, ratchet, crimp connectors, tape, tie wraps, heat shrink, light bulbs, fuses, wet wipes, digital volt meter, 9V battery, lighter, signal horn and a FIRST AID KIT. Need to add wire after reading this. One of these days I will add jumper cables too.

If you use the line conditioner keep your reels out of a dusty area. Line conditioner will catch every bit of dust which can cause your baitcaster performance to degrade.

If a guy is getting two close I let him know about it. Then I whip out my phone and take a picture of him. Then I post it on the internet. Like this idiot from Maryland that was a butthead on the Potomac! Or this other idiot.....

3/8" heat shrink works the best. It takes me a long time to go through a pack of senkos now!

I have a 788ci on the front of my boat and a 798c SI on the console. I should have spent the extra money to get a 798ci SI on the front. The 788 and 798 are identical units in every way except the 798 has side imaging and down imaging. The 2D and GPS performance are the same. I really like my 788 but I love my 798!

My partner has the Edge, I have a Maxxum. I would not buy an Edge. The release gets stuck and it is hard to deploy. He broke the rope in the first couple months. It has only 5 speeds and it eats batteries on a windy day. Both are 70lb units but my Maxxum is better in all ways.

The water intrusion (leakage) was NOT limited to one unit. It happened across a broad array of units. My partner purchased a 2008 Skeeter ZX190 with a Lowrance X-135 and Eagle 640C. In the first month we fished in the rain and the Eagle died. Then the second month we fished in the rain and the Lowrance died. You could shake each unit and hear the water inside. There are many threads with angry Lowrance customers on here. Lowrance fired their best customer service representative as well. Buy what you like best. It is a free country for the moment ;D

Wagn, I was on canals next to Lake Okechobee and the gps said that we were on land. Follow Wayne's advice and use the map offset function to move the map to fix the problem.

The 797's memory is maxed out. They may not be able to fit another cool upgrade into. They had to do some backflips to get the downscan upgrade to fit in the 797. I bought the 798c SI and it is fantastic!