chowder

SS So, the 'Bigger offseason Boat project' started when i moved from near the fingerlakes to right next to the Niagara River Lake Ontario , and Lake Erie for real this past summer. Sixteen years ago when I got 'reinvolved' with fishing and subsequently involved with LOU I managed to convince my sweet wife (seriously) to allow me to get a 16' aluminum deep V and set it up to fish Cayuga lake which was 'big water' and not far away. As this 'passion' (my wife would call it something else) matured I eventually got a lil bit bigger Islander for Ontario and eventually bit the whole enchilada and started a part time charter business. For the past couple years I've done a small amount of trips with my Crestliner 245 hardtop that replaced the Islander I had for many years. The 245 hardtop came rigged mostly rigged to fish but Hank at L&M installed a large screen Lowrance HDS gen 3 with autopilot. That boat was purchased out in Minnesota at a very,very attractive price. Now, back to the original 16' boat: over the years the 'Lil boat' got a lot of upgrades and it was an awesome ANYSEASON boat that I and many here on LOU had some daring escapades on. BUT- after moving from the Fingerlakes proximity to next to Ontario (all to be with the love of my life who moved back to her hometown to care for her mom) the lil boat was just not up to the rigors of the Niagara River or safe, roomy, cold weather charters on the Great lakes. Anyway here's where the plot thickens because my sweet wife put her foot down and basically said you can put together this 'bigger boat' but it better pay for itself!! Fellas, that's a tough thing to contemplate and nevr mind accomplish but after many conversations with Hank at L&M, a plan was hatched. STEP 1.) Sold Esther II (the 'lil boat' (very sad...) then bought an old Crestliner Sabre 2105 SST Great lakes Special for next to nothing with a 150 hp OMC outboard.(motor is for sale and priced right if interested) STEP 2.) Bought a used 200 Hp. Optimax after seeing compression checked, watching it start cold , run, shift etc. (note; bought new controls for it). That is where the project is now unfolding underneath Hank's custom mobile retrofitting facility. I will keep updates rolling as 'Comments'. Step 3.) will obviously be the power plant swap/controls install. Step 4.) will be electric upgrades to enable the install of a 36 volt Spot Lock, autopilot MinnKota bowmount. Step 5.) Install my lowrance Hook, as a quik detach deal that I use for icefishing and in my kayak Step 6.) reinstall the late model electric down riggers and planer riggers from Esther I (the old 'lil boat' and some new trax and cannon rod holders. I'm sure this will be a journey with some twists and turns-I'll keep ya posted.NOTE: All blame for mistakes, poor judgement calls and general stupidity involved with this, as with past crazy ideas of mine, are entirely my fault- In no way should anyone confuse L&M's good natured attempts to humor me and my insanity as in anyway responsible for any pitfalls...

The truth is that the devil is in the details. There are always paths that lead to better results, the goal is identify and pursue them instead of saying’Yeah, what’s a 20 year boat loan anyway’

I have heard a lot of things that people have to say about boats but I have heard very few things that make sense to me about boats and money. People say things like" a new 4 stroke will save you money on fuel" - not trying to be a pita but the p and i on a 14k capital purchase will pretty quickly make that statement look like what it is. I did the fuel expense vs. p and i math on a kicker when I first considered one and had to conclude that only a used one , bought right, could concievably produce a better rate of return than leaving the money in mutual funds. I spent 9k for my 'big' Crestliner, a 245 Eagle , walk around hard top. it was completely equipped though I did have L&M install a large screen HDS /Autopilot. As a part time charter boat it MAY eventually produce an acceptable rate of return. My 'new to me' 'small' Crestliner, a 205 Sabre open bow (for Niagara River drifting work/early browns in the offseason and as a backup to the 'big' Crestliner and or as my lake Erie boat, is currently a work in progress. The boat itself was relatively inexpensive. However I have elected to repower it with a used 200 hp Optimax and I'm going to equip it with a 112 lb thrust Saltwater model bow mount with i-pilot/spot lock and the associated batteries and on board charger, etc. I'm just going to share my Lowrance 7 hook from kayak with this boat so not much electronics for now. So will this thing have a positive rate of return? Jury will be out for a while and a lot depends on potential issues with the used 2005 200 hp Saltwater model Optimax. I will have 3K+ in this motor- it had excellent compression, cold started, ran and shifted but....Here's the thing for anybody thinking about going this way with a boat purchase: Used, late model, High HP FRESH WATER ONLY Outboards are scarcer than hen's teeth. The fact you may have to wait , what is an unacceptable amount of time to find one, or that it could be very high priced, may make this option a moot point. So, we'll see I guess. In summation, if you are married to someone who doesn't care what you do with your COMBINED income or you are single then what I'm saying probably doesn't matter (well it does matter but you don't have to care about it). If you are married and your spouse does really care about expenditures of your COMBINED income then perhaps you need to consider exactly how you spend 'the fishing dollar'. Cheers!

We hit a very large submerged log with my big Crestliner (245 Eagle) doing 26mph. It did put a dent in the hull but it was repaired. If you fish a lot then sooner or later sumpin is gonna happen...

When i first started on Erie I used the same gear I used on Oneida which are basically my browns rods- The Eagle claw 7' med light with 15 series Daiwa lc reels for divers (braid) riggers and cores to 8 colors and walleye coppers. Walleye don't really give you much of a fight and my customers liked maximizing what a walleye is capable of. I was fine with those rigs until I ran into bonus fish like Big lakers, Channel Cats, and Steelhead so I eventually had to gear up a bit and leave the true walleye gear in the lil boat for Oneida because it just proved difficult to muscle the Cats and the pig lakers up with the med light rods. I will say that part of this issue was the difficulty of consistently getting clients their 6 eye limit this year as opposed to the previous 2 years so I began more actively targeting the bonus fish much earlier into the trips.

Bloody hell man. That's flatout out of my budget! I'm looking at motors for roughly 4K that I can see cylinder pressure testing done on and then cold start/shift/run etc.

I'm going through this variation now but it's not for the faint hearted. It's been obvious to me for years that the new boats are just completely out of my range (Personally, I'm not going to spend what amounts to a mortgage payment on a toy) Anyway, the older hull and repower is what I'm looking at for a bigger 'offseason' boat' because I can't afford to consider having an old motor issue with customers on board. What I'm seeing is that even a repower is gonna have to be a used/rebuilt motor because a new Optimax or equiv is gonna be 14-20k depending on Hp.

PM sent

Boat is a 165 Alumacraft. 16 and a 1/2 feet. NOTE: So far I've found nothing remotely affordable to move into as far a somewhat larger 'offseason boat' so at this point I am not in any kind of hurry to sell this boat. I am currently using it out of the Fort Launch at the mouth of the Niagara River to troll the bar and jig and alternately to run up to Lewiston and drift 3 ways for walleye and smallmouth. It does have a nice Minn Kota bowmount with a brand new foot pedal control (could use a 2nd trolling battery or a new one and I might put one and another in come winter)

Testing out the water to move into a bigger 'off season' boat for my part time charter business so considering selling my current 'winter boat' 40 hp 4 stroke Mercury 6 hp 4 stroke Mercury kicker with Pro-troll throttle control Raymarine Sport Pilot auto pilot 16" Lowrance lcx sonar/gps 5" Lowrance lxc backup sonar/gps 840 Fish hawk 2 manual Cannon down riggers 2 manual Penn downriggers Trax tech tracks Trax tech dipsy rod holders Aluminum rod trees Heavy duty John Mann custom made full enclosure Maintained and serviced by Hank at L&M $6000 firm Potentially available for extra cost with: 2 new Cannon mag 10 riggers with swivels 2 new Big Jon electric planer reels on single mast alumacraft.html alumacraft.html

If you really want to target Smallmouth I'd suggest going out of SBH on Erie. Should be able to get onto em in 30-40FOW with tubes pulled across bottom or crawfish suspended straight down just off the bottom,

Dean's for sure!

You gotta be kidding me- this guy should be banned from the LOU