Thanks bobberboy. We surprised ourselves. This was the first time we tried to tackle anything like this. It wasn't really a dream to even do this project. We just knew we wanted something bigger & better than our little 14ft john and didn't want to take on a loan to get it. So we got this boat, trailer & an ancient 60hp Johnson for $500. Got rid of the 60hp. It was questionable and besides, we have lakes we like to fish with 25hp limits. Then it was months of scouring Craigslist, amazon, google, youtube and this site to figure out what we were going to do, how we were going to do it and what could we get for the best price. The motor is a (basically new) 25hp Merc 2 stroke. It came from an estate auction. The original owner bought it new in 2003. Within a couple months of buying it, he became ill and passed away. It then sat in his garage until his wife passed away 10 years later. Her family then sold it at the auction. After having it serviced, new lines, carb gaskets, impeller, etc etc... we were into the motor for $1600. Total project cost was around $3200. I'm sure we could have found a decent used boat for that price. But we could have still ended up replacing floor, carpet, motor and god knows what else within a few years. This wasn't always a fun project. Lots of frustrations. But I think we did ok and should have plenty use out of her for qite sometime.
