Last night, I only had enough daylight to get to Home Depot for lumber and get the boat emptied and prepped. Here are the cleaned out pics, notice the nice rust stains from the swivel seats being in there for a few years.

Today I was able to get an earlier start so I was able to actually make some progress. With a little help from my lil buddy and a friend (I am showing him the new invisible step). Actually my wife snapped a pic as I was jumping out heh.

I was able to make some progress. What I did was made rails out of the 2x3's for support braces. I am going to screw cross members into the plywood flooring to make the actual floors two large hatches for the storage area underneath. Near the transom, I split the deck so I can store the gas tank and everything underneath and the middle section is going to stay open so fumes have a place to evaporate. Again, both decks will open as a hatch.

As darkness fell, and my batteries died in my cordless drill I finished cutting out the basic shapes for the bow casting deck. I have since decided I will probably cut it down and make it more like the middle decks and have it lower than the seat. I am going to do this simply because I am pretty much stuck in the back of the boat because of the tiller steer motor and the transom mount TM. This will make mounting a front seat easier as I can just mount it on the bench seat. The guys I normally have fishing the front of my boat are a little more up in years and I think would rather a comfy seat rather than large casting deck. This way they will have a fishable seat with plenty of legroom, and I won't have to worry about having a 20" pedestel up there in the V. A shorter base mounted on the bench should be just the ticket, and if I have someone uup there that wants to stand up there will be plenty of room for that too.  

Hopefully the forecast is correct and I will have three nice warm days this coming week to get the front half decked, the bench tops covered, and all of the lumber water sealed and carpeted.

Looks like it is coming along nicely.  I am thinking about doing the same to my father in laws boat.  How are you securing the vertical braces to the floor of the boat.  I am not a carpenter by any means but in my head it doesn't look like it will be that big of a project.  Thanks for your help.

I am screwing them into the existing bench seats with stainless screws. I have the horizontal footers srewed down onto the vertical braces, and the whole frame is screwed to the bench. I hope this helps.

After a rest and planning session with my help, I was able to put in a few hours after work today.

We got all of the decking cut and in place.

I used Joeybago'donuts idea for the front deck, only modified a tad, I put in a T connector for support in the middle and used the main ribs in the hull for the lateral support. In the end it feels very sturdy and strong. I am going to cut one more vertical support for near the seat, and possibly one 2x3 on each side of the front deck, but due to the small span and the doubled plywood it feels plenty strong. The 2x3's on the bottom of the deck fit snugly around the center support making for zero movement.

Tomorrow after work, it is time for water sealing andfinal fitting before carpet goes on when we get another nice day. We are supposed to get rain through the weekend here starting wednesday

Are you working on that thing in the street?  

Ugg, that would suck.

lol yea, welcome to philly...  :-?

Good luck!  What size boat is that?

Good luck. I take it you are going to carpet it to muffle the sound.

All you guys that go through these boats are amazing to me. I put a transom in a 1988 Skeeter Starfire and recarpet and I will never, ever do it again. Too much work for me. Enjoy the boat. Looks like it will be nice.

Looks marvey so far!  Are you using treated lumber?

Keep the pics comming.Very interesting.

It is a 14' FLBassMan. I am going to carpet it all here very soon after I iron out a few design details. The lumber is regular pine/plywood that I got at Home Depot. I treated it myself with Thomson's water seal.

Work has kinda slowed to a crawl here as my schedule has folled up, but I plan on working on her again real soon and will be sure to post more pics.

FINALLY some progress!!

Well, I finally had some time off when it wasn't raining, sleeting, or snowing up here. : My wife has made it "her project" to carpet the decks. As you will see from the pics I had no arguements, she is doing a great job and it allowed me today to tackle the seating installation.

What I did was drill a hole using the hole saw and dug out as much of the floatation foam as needed to reach under to get the washers and nuts on the installation boats. Since my wife was carpeting the decks I was able to focus on installation and the seating. Here are some after pics from today. I apologize for not having any shots of progress as it came, we were trying to get it done before dark.

Now I will need to focus on the electronics and wiring. Not exactly sure how that is going to work out, but so far I am pleased with the progress. There are HUGE slow periods but it seems once we get around to it we make some decent progress.

Looking good. Keep up the good work and keep the pictures coming as the progress does.

Sweet looken BackPain. Love it that ya got your help there

I'm currently doing one myself its a 1436 flat jon and my help is there too

I'd say the worst thing has been the paint I'd rather not go thru that again

Keep it up and post about the electronics too

Today we almost got her finished! I still need to run the wiring, and install the rod holders and some other odds and ends. I am still waiting on the seats to be delivered, so those have to wait. I am also going to wait and see how the boat sits in the water before I run the permanent wiring. I will place the battery where she helps ballast the boat best. I am thinking I will need it in the front, but you never know. Here are some pics with the carpeting finished!

Looking great!!

Very similar to what I want to get started on once the snow melts!

Well done....love the "box" at the back where the tank sits!!

She is finished! Here are some pics when I am using her for live bait fishing for stripers/catfish. I will add some later with the trolling motor on and set up for bassin'.

All in all I couldn't be more please with how it came out, it was 100% easier to fish from and I noticed no loss of freeboard, or speed with the extra weight.

Nice lookin.  I look forward to seeing how you mount that trolling motor.

I am reviving the old thread because I finally decided since I couldn't fish in it over the winter I would get the bow mounted trolling motor on there and a more permanant electrical setup. I have some pics of the trolling motor setup, but need to get some of the wiring for anyone interested. I spent a bored cold evening (this time in the garage as we got all of the trash cleaned out of it) mulling over how I could mount the TM with what I had on hand. I decided on some 1/2" plywood and a piece of 2x8 left over from a building project. I fastened it to the deck with "L" brackets on the back side. and cut out a piece of decking to go on the top of the gunwal and screwed down into the 2x8 and around the gunwal with self tapping screws. Here are a few pics.

In my mind I am thinking this is a temporary setup. I think next year I might redeck the front to a more traditional platform. It all depends on what I end up fishing. I have migrated more and more towards bass fishing pretty exclusively so the way the front deck is setup might have to change. I will probably build in a livewell as well if and when when I do that. I am going to fish it as is for a season and then make the decision, it might be just fine and I leave it as is.

When I get back out there I will get some pics of the wiring. Who knows when that will be as I am getting a lumbar cortisone shot tomorrow so the weekend might be shot who knows with those things.

 Taking shape ,huh! It's looking good. Pics are nice...

skillet

BTW farmpond 1, depending on what kind of glue you use for the carpet, some of it won't stick to treated lumber

Looks good keep the pic coming nice family great to have help.

Looks nice, kept it simple which makes it look better and didnt add to much weight. Can't wait to start my build this summer.

Excellent thread and nice work. I noticed you moved the fishfinder from the rear to front deck or is that a second finder? How did the wiring come along and what type of battery did you go with?

I just picked up a 12' Starcraft flat bottom with trailer. Finally had a nice weekend and have just started my rebuild, mostly worked on the trailer for starters. Will post pics soon also.

Happy building and tight lines! (Wish my wife agreed as much as yours   )