I am going to buy my first trolling motor today.  It's a Minn Kota Endura 50, transom mount.  I am going to mount it on the bow of my restored 15-foot tri-hull.  I know I have to make a seat for it to mount on the front, but I have two questions.  

1.  It's a 36-inch shaft and my boat sits pretty low in the water, but it looks like I may need to slide the shaft down a little just in case.  Is it possible to slide the shaft in the transom mounting bracket or is it fixed?  If that doesn't make sense, I want to make the length of shaft between the mounting bracket and the tiller a few inches shorter.

2.  How do I flip the actual motor around so that the tiller handle and prop are both facing aft?

Day one questions, I know, but I've never had a trolling motor.  I figured I better get one because rumbling up on the fish in my 85hp 2 stroke didn't seem to be the best way to catch fish.

Thanks

Here is a link for turning the head around.

http://www.bassresource.com/bass_fishing_forums/YaBB.pl?num=1169146061

To move the shaft up and down, there should be a clamp with a kneural nut above the transom clamp.  The shaft can only as far down as the clamp.  Just loosen the clamp and slide the shaft down.

I have turned the head around and it wasn't too much trouble.  One thing you may want to consider is buying an aftermarket handle like the ones big foot offer.  They just attach on the shaft and you don't have to open up the motor.  The only issue is it will still have the 'old' handle sticking out in front.  Just an idea- something I wished I would have thought of a couple years ago.  

http://www.nextag.com/trolling-motor-handle/search-html

I've got doubts that a 36" shaft will be long enough to bow mount your TM.  Those are primarily for transome mounting.  I know you say it sit's low and it's going to have to sit real low for a 36" shaft.  What is probably going to happen is it won't stay in the water if there are any waves or boat wakes.  This can create a serious problem fishing close to the bank and rocks where you can get bottomed out because of no whay to control the boat, caused by the TM being bounced out of the water more than it's in.

I did this to my boat, I had a mach1 speedboat that i converted into a part time bass boat. I built a trolling motor mount out of 2x8 treated wood to clamp over my front. My mount extended 13" over the front, used a steel L-bracket to mount a 2x2 for the motor to clamp too. The 36" shaft worked great on the boat until we hit 2' waves.

The only thing I wish I did was install 2 industrial hinges to pull the motor out of the water with. I had to remove the motor from the front every time I needed to move far.