thill
Well-known member
Greetings, all. My name is Tony, and I live in central Virginia, near Lake Anna.
I have fished all my life, and have seriously boated for the last 20 years or so. All of my many boats have been fiberglass until a few years ago when we moved near the lake here. My boat was a big Grady White, which is pretty huge for the lake. Wanting something smaller, I bought an old jon boat off Craigslist.
It was a 14' mod-v bottom Monark with an 8 HP Evinrude. The boat worked fine, but was hard to get on plane, only getting up to maybe 12-15 MPH. I fished it a few times, quickly bored of it, sold it and went back to saltwater fishing.
Well, the gas prices jumped, and I found myself trailering the 3 hours to Virginia Beach less and less often. Sold the Grady and moved to a smaller center console. This got me to thinking about fishing locally again. So I picked up an old, gutted out aluminum boat with no titles, but a nice Yamaha 9.9 for $600. The boat was deep (33") and wide, (60"+) and seemed to have potential, despite how ugly it was:
It was gutted out, with nothing inside besides a big box seat, but the Yamaha had promise:
So I came up with a proposed plan to modify the boat to fish out of:
I started the project, and cut the front deck. I figured I'd use a nice A-B cabinet plywood primed and sealed:
But life got busy, and progress stalled. I covered the boat, but the cover caved in with 3' of snow. Didn't look under there until the next summer, and the trapped moisture had rotted the plywood! I had nothing in it, so I just covered it up and left it. Sold the motor to recoup some cash.
Last summer, we went to Nags Head, and there was some great fishing in the shallows, and my brother and friend had a blast in their kayaks, catching puppy drum and trout. Gave me the push to get my jon boat project moving this time! So I gutted out the rotten stuff and started over.
First things first, I needed to replace the transom wood. Used two layers of PT plywood, cut to size, then glassed together with fiberglass mat and resin to make super strong. Then applied a wet layer of glass mat to the transom, and bolted the transom on. I didn't want the PT to touch the aluminum in any way. Applied several coats of resin on the outside to seal, and then painted black to match the rest of the boat. Worked well, and this transom will hold any motor I put on it!
This time, I decided to think out the structure a little better. Decided on a light PT wooden frame, secured by aluminum angle and isolated from the hull with high density fill foam, to prevent electrolysis:
This time, for the decking, I used a 3/4" exterior grade SYP plywood saturated with several layers of wood preserver. Polyurethane adhesive and screwed down to the stringers. Around the perimeter, I foamed it in to avoid "hard" spots and help bond the deck to the hull:
I cut a couple of hatches in for storage, and then once it was dry, I carpeted it:
After that, I added some soft plywood to the inside of the transom, to give the clamp-on motors a good "bite", and found a 15 HP Johnson, tuned it up and took her for her maiden run.
The motor ran great, but I was NOT happy with the performance. She got on plane much better than the 9.9, but was not any faster once up on plane, maybe 12-16 MPH. Still, no leaks, and at least I was getting closer!
What I needed was more power to enjoy the boat enough to use regularly. I found the original Crestiler brochure on the Crestliner site, and discovered this boat came with 40-60 HP from the factory! Definitely could handle more power!
So I found a locked-up 1995 Evinrude 25 for $150. Figured I'd try to get it freed up, or use for parts, and sure enough, letting some WD40 soak in the cylinders, and using a breaker bar, I got it loose! Cleaned the carbs, changed the impeller, and she runs great!
After that, I added a bow-mount trolling motor, batteries, fishfinder, etc and took her for her maiden run with the 25...
SHE RAN GREAT! That little 25 makes this boat fly! I forgot to bring my GPS, but I'd say she does at least 25 MPH. Very happy with the performance! The only thing is that the boat was very back-heavy, so I had to move all the batteries and gas tank up front to balance it out when alone. With two people, she ran GREAT.
And that's where I am right now. The boat is running well, but needs a LOT of cleaning up, electrical work, rodholders, and so on.
I'm mostly concerned with safety and seaworthiness, and WOW, does she perform well, even through heavy chop! Those big spray rails shoot everything out sideways, and the deep V parts the waves impressively. I had been a bit concerned with the bunk removal, but I'm very happy with how solid the boat feels, and with how the deck bonding has unified the hull. This hull is probably thicker than most of the newer hulls, and that doesn't hurt, for sure.
Right now, I'm trying to decide what to do in the back of the boat. Leave it alone, or build a rear platform? Right now, I like the depth of the boat, both in the front and in the main cockpit, so I'm leaning toward either making a bunk the width of my back corner seat to add enclosed storage, or just leaving it as-is.
Here is the interior of the boat as it currently stands:
It's a little embarrassing to post this, considering the absolutely beautiful work I've seen here. But it is what it is. After getting the structure and functional stuff done, I'll have to ask around for the best way to strip the many layers of old peeling paint.
Safety and fishing first, cosmetics later!
Thanks for all of your sharing on this site.
-TH
I have fished all my life, and have seriously boated for the last 20 years or so. All of my many boats have been fiberglass until a few years ago when we moved near the lake here. My boat was a big Grady White, which is pretty huge for the lake. Wanting something smaller, I bought an old jon boat off Craigslist.
It was a 14' mod-v bottom Monark with an 8 HP Evinrude. The boat worked fine, but was hard to get on plane, only getting up to maybe 12-15 MPH. I fished it a few times, quickly bored of it, sold it and went back to saltwater fishing.
Well, the gas prices jumped, and I found myself trailering the 3 hours to Virginia Beach less and less often. Sold the Grady and moved to a smaller center console. This got me to thinking about fishing locally again. So I picked up an old, gutted out aluminum boat with no titles, but a nice Yamaha 9.9 for $600. The boat was deep (33") and wide, (60"+) and seemed to have potential, despite how ugly it was:
It was gutted out, with nothing inside besides a big box seat, but the Yamaha had promise:
So I came up with a proposed plan to modify the boat to fish out of:
I started the project, and cut the front deck. I figured I'd use a nice A-B cabinet plywood primed and sealed:
But life got busy, and progress stalled. I covered the boat, but the cover caved in with 3' of snow. Didn't look under there until the next summer, and the trapped moisture had rotted the plywood! I had nothing in it, so I just covered it up and left it. Sold the motor to recoup some cash.
Last summer, we went to Nags Head, and there was some great fishing in the shallows, and my brother and friend had a blast in their kayaks, catching puppy drum and trout. Gave me the push to get my jon boat project moving this time! So I gutted out the rotten stuff and started over.
First things first, I needed to replace the transom wood. Used two layers of PT plywood, cut to size, then glassed together with fiberglass mat and resin to make super strong. Then applied a wet layer of glass mat to the transom, and bolted the transom on. I didn't want the PT to touch the aluminum in any way. Applied several coats of resin on the outside to seal, and then painted black to match the rest of the boat. Worked well, and this transom will hold any motor I put on it!
This time, I decided to think out the structure a little better. Decided on a light PT wooden frame, secured by aluminum angle and isolated from the hull with high density fill foam, to prevent electrolysis:
This time, for the decking, I used a 3/4" exterior grade SYP plywood saturated with several layers of wood preserver. Polyurethane adhesive and screwed down to the stringers. Around the perimeter, I foamed it in to avoid "hard" spots and help bond the deck to the hull:
I cut a couple of hatches in for storage, and then once it was dry, I carpeted it:
After that, I added some soft plywood to the inside of the transom, to give the clamp-on motors a good "bite", and found a 15 HP Johnson, tuned it up and took her for her maiden run.
The motor ran great, but I was NOT happy with the performance. She got on plane much better than the 9.9, but was not any faster once up on plane, maybe 12-16 MPH. Still, no leaks, and at least I was getting closer!
What I needed was more power to enjoy the boat enough to use regularly. I found the original Crestiler brochure on the Crestliner site, and discovered this boat came with 40-60 HP from the factory! Definitely could handle more power!
So I found a locked-up 1995 Evinrude 25 for $150. Figured I'd try to get it freed up, or use for parts, and sure enough, letting some WD40 soak in the cylinders, and using a breaker bar, I got it loose! Cleaned the carbs, changed the impeller, and she runs great!
After that, I added a bow-mount trolling motor, batteries, fishfinder, etc and took her for her maiden run with the 25...
SHE RAN GREAT! That little 25 makes this boat fly! I forgot to bring my GPS, but I'd say she does at least 25 MPH. Very happy with the performance! The only thing is that the boat was very back-heavy, so I had to move all the batteries and gas tank up front to balance it out when alone. With two people, she ran GREAT.
And that's where I am right now. The boat is running well, but needs a LOT of cleaning up, electrical work, rodholders, and so on.
I'm mostly concerned with safety and seaworthiness, and WOW, does she perform well, even through heavy chop! Those big spray rails shoot everything out sideways, and the deep V parts the waves impressively. I had been a bit concerned with the bunk removal, but I'm very happy with how solid the boat feels, and with how the deck bonding has unified the hull. This hull is probably thicker than most of the newer hulls, and that doesn't hurt, for sure.
Right now, I'm trying to decide what to do in the back of the boat. Leave it alone, or build a rear platform? Right now, I like the depth of the boat, both in the front and in the main cockpit, so I'm leaning toward either making a bunk the width of my back corner seat to add enclosed storage, or just leaving it as-is.
Here is the interior of the boat as it currently stands:
It's a little embarrassing to post this, considering the absolutely beautiful work I've seen here. But it is what it is. After getting the structure and functional stuff done, I'll have to ask around for the best way to strip the many layers of old peeling paint.
Safety and fishing first, cosmetics later!
Thanks for all of your sharing on this site.
-TH
