chowder
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Posts posted by chowder
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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!
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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...
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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.
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12 hours ago, bandrus1 said:
Oh yeah my repower 90 hp with rewire and controls was almost 12k in 2011
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.
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On 10/24/2020 at 7:51 AM, bandrus1 said:
My personal suggestion would buy an older hull and deck it out including a new motor
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.
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On 9/24/2020 at 9:47 AM, SteelCity said:
Hello. Is this still for sale? Do you use it on Lake Ontario or smaller surrounding lakes?
PM sent
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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)
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20 hours ago, DoubleTrouble1 said:
I have a guy in Gaines that might have some space....but that's not Lockport lmk I'll pm his number
Sent from my LM-V450 using Lake Ontario United mobile app
I keep the big boat at LakeBreeze at the Oak so used to going over there, fish out of there very early spring and probably this fall too so not a bad location at all for me. Thanks!
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I have to find storage with a roof for my off season boat 16.5' and my kayaks. If anybody out this way has any knowledge of such a possibility, please let me know. Thanks!
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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
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So when I was digging through the box of weird stuff that came with the boat when I bought it to get out the Moor subtroll monitor and wiring I came across a box in the bottom that had a complete Big Jon Monitroll display, wiring, and fish hawk probe ( apparently it was all Fish hawk Technology). I’m guessing that the frequency of this 840 era fish hawk must be the same as the X 4 because I have used the new probe with the the 840 in my lil boat. Anybody got any helpful hints on the Big Jon 900 monitor? It’s the same housing as the 840 but the option buttons are very different . Also wondering what would happen if I mounted the 840 era monitor in the back of the boat and attempted to pick up the signal from the x 4 probe on the 840 transducer as well as the x 4 transducer . Then I would have a display in the back of the boat too for free. Seems like it might work?
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19 hours ago, Sk8man said:
I have the Fishhawk X4D Andy. There are guys that have it on here so maybe they will respond. It is pretty pricey with all the probes but very nice to be able to attach a probe to individual lines too. Hopefully someone who has the unit will chime in.
Yeah, I checked it out. I've had FHs since 2006 so it was a knee jerk reaction to putting one in Emily III when rigging her last year. Had I known then what I've learned about moving around the boat amidst customers and had I known about this multi probe unit then I might have considered changing horses. Hindsight is always 20/20.
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4 hours ago, FishingFool34 said:
Why not just make your probe rigger your deepest line? That way you should have a really close idea of what your other rigger is in temp-wise. Plus if your probe is your deepest you can run it up and check the temp above it without needing to reset. I think you would have issues trying to run two fishawks and multiple signals on the same frequency (I could be wrong on this). Your best bet you be to run some other brand temp system on the other rigger if you really wanted to do that.
Problem is: time is so of the essence when getting customers on fish especially on tough days. When I'm moving out or in across the depth range and the temp break is changing I frequently feel like I just don't have time to move around the back of the boat having to ask clients to move and doing anything more than I have to do all ready (no mate except the AP).
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4 hours ago, Sk8man said:
Interesting... Les, do you have this unit?
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43 minutes ago, mr 580 said:
If you ran one FH with transducer and a Subtroll/Depth Raider with coated cable, you could have two read outs. Temp should be OK, but speed likely hard to compare as the different manufacturers speed ranges vary. I’ve felt that FH tends to be a few tenths faster than a DR for example. Don’t think two FH’s would work with 2 transducers trying to read two probes at same frequency. Think it would end up easier moving one probe around to get data.
Frank; Agreed the DR/FH combo was pretty much the scenario i was backing my way into, especially since I have an unused DR probe/display. I even have a rigger with the coated cable (have to admit though ,I was thrilled to get away from the cable technology when I got the 1st FH 840 unit on a boat years ago.) . Reason I originally was looking at a 2nd unit was I thought I needed a new spare probe but turns out it was just leaking a little water into the battery compartment so I was looking at my options. I agree the FH reads a bit faster-hopefully temp comparisons will be easy to figure out.
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Have had some squirrelly days lately when I wish I had temp at 2 different riggers lately. Not that I cant get it the info by moving one probe around but curious if it's feasible to run 2 probes?
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Bought a Merc 9.9 Prokicker from them in 2018. No issues
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I need to change tension from Ontario to Erie to Cayuga to Oneida
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I've had 2 Black's releases develop striped threads for the small tension adjustment screw (one actually fell right out) in the past year. Anybody else had this and have the reason figured out? Thanks
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You should start out where you mark bottom focused lakers. If you head towards Dean's You are gonna mark them starting in 30-40 fow very 1st thing . You will find yourself working out more to 60 fow + as sun get's higher. Personally, I don't make a drop if i don't see what i want on the sonar 1st.
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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,
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Dean's for sure!
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13 hours ago, Tradman said:
they are yours I couldn't give a rats azz and secondly I didn't jump in and offer to sell an item cheaper than the poster, face it Tom you are an azzhole
You gotta be kidding me- this guy should be banned from the LOU
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This is awesome , thanks to all!
Best brand / value deep V aluminum boat?
in Open Lake Discussion
Posted
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’