I feel a little guilty putting this in DIY, as I'm having some of the work done by experts and I've had plenty of help from friends....but here goes. This is a work in progress, that I'm doing as I can, so I'll update as progress is made.
We have a pretty cool lake on our place near Woodville. My wife likes to fish it, but she doesn't like to fish from kayaks and bank fishing just limits us too much. Back in 2022, I bought a little 17' Sea Ark off of a TBHer's buddy to fish on the lake. It's served us well, but this year I decided to rebuild it into more of what I wanted to use it for.
(This pic is not at our lake) As you can see from the pic above, it's a side console with a 40hp Mercury. Has a decent front deck and a small rear deck. Not much storage and the livewell, right in front of the console, didn't work. Foot controlled trolling motor provided plenty of thrust for getting around our lake. Both decks were pretty slick, as anti skid had worn off over the years. Rub rails were nicked and rough edged and cost my wife a HOGG when her line ran across the rail and hit a rough spot and snapped. That was all my fault, she decided.
I decided I wanted to make some changes to make it more fishing friendly for our lake. I planned to make the deck bigger, get rid of everything that we didn't use or need and open some things up.
The first thing I did was remove everything from the boat. The outdated electronics, the trolling motor, the rod holders, the seats, the steering wheel and console and the 40 horse all got removed.
Since I would never in a million years attempt to weld aluminum, I sent the boat over to the brother of a friend of ours that owns a boat shop. He welded up the deck with reinforcement, put in a couple of hatches and gave me what I was looking for. He patched the holes where the motor was mounted. Also had him move trolling motor mount to the center of the bow, instead of offset to the side. I traded him the 40hp Merc (which I'd never cranked) for the metal work, so it was a net zero cost to me. He also ran new wires for the trolling motor and fixed the livewell, without my asking. Good dude.
(This pic is kind of half finished. Livewell hatch gets recessed and back gets closed with hatch)
Now comes the hard part. I want to repaint the boat and to do that, I decided to get rid of all the paint and the only way I knew to do that was grinders, abrasion wheel and time. Had a lot of help from a couple of folks on this part. The couple that live and work on the farm, used a few rainy days, when nothing else was happening, to help me out or it would have taken me 3x as long in my spare time.
Finished grinding it all yesterday. Got it washed and degreased on the bottom side and getting ready for paint.
I ordered a Light Gray Aluminum paint from TotalBoat.com. Their customer support was helpful in educating me on what I'd need to do to prep and paint the aluminum hull and topside. Paint should be here later this week and I'll be back to the farm in a couple weeks to prep and paint. I then have plans to take it to East Texas Safe Floor, just down the road in Warren to get a new marine floor put on the deck. I plan to install a new iPilot trolling motor with some new electronics. New seats as well.
I have some concerns:
1. I don't know if taking the weight of the motor off the back will make it sit funky in the water. If so, I'll just add some weight to the back hatch with something.
2. I don't yet know if I'll need a rudder of some sort in the back. I'm hoping having the trolling motor in the center of the bow, will be enough to have it trail true, but if not, I'll add a removable rudder of some sort.
Give my your thoughts on these issues.
I'll update as I progress. Thanks for looking.
We have a pretty cool lake on our place near Woodville. My wife likes to fish it, but she doesn't like to fish from kayaks and bank fishing just limits us too much. Back in 2022, I bought a little 17' Sea Ark off of a TBHer's buddy to fish on the lake. It's served us well, but this year I decided to rebuild it into more of what I wanted to use it for.
(This pic is not at our lake) As you can see from the pic above, it's a side console with a 40hp Mercury. Has a decent front deck and a small rear deck. Not much storage and the livewell, right in front of the console, didn't work. Foot controlled trolling motor provided plenty of thrust for getting around our lake. Both decks were pretty slick, as anti skid had worn off over the years. Rub rails were nicked and rough edged and cost my wife a HOGG when her line ran across the rail and hit a rough spot and snapped. That was all my fault, she decided.
I decided I wanted to make some changes to make it more fishing friendly for our lake. I planned to make the deck bigger, get rid of everything that we didn't use or need and open some things up.
The first thing I did was remove everything from the boat. The outdated electronics, the trolling motor, the rod holders, the seats, the steering wheel and console and the 40 horse all got removed.
Since I would never in a million years attempt to weld aluminum, I sent the boat over to the brother of a friend of ours that owns a boat shop. He welded up the deck with reinforcement, put in a couple of hatches and gave me what I was looking for. He patched the holes where the motor was mounted. Also had him move trolling motor mount to the center of the bow, instead of offset to the side. I traded him the 40hp Merc (which I'd never cranked) for the metal work, so it was a net zero cost to me. He also ran new wires for the trolling motor and fixed the livewell, without my asking. Good dude.
(This pic is kind of half finished. Livewell hatch gets recessed and back gets closed with hatch)
Now comes the hard part. I want to repaint the boat and to do that, I decided to get rid of all the paint and the only way I knew to do that was grinders, abrasion wheel and time. Had a lot of help from a couple of folks on this part. The couple that live and work on the farm, used a few rainy days, when nothing else was happening, to help me out or it would have taken me 3x as long in my spare time.
Finished grinding it all yesterday. Got it washed and degreased on the bottom side and getting ready for paint.
I ordered a Light Gray Aluminum paint from TotalBoat.com. Their customer support was helpful in educating me on what I'd need to do to prep and paint the aluminum hull and topside. Paint should be here later this week and I'll be back to the farm in a couple weeks to prep and paint. I then have plans to take it to East Texas Safe Floor, just down the road in Warren to get a new marine floor put on the deck. I plan to install a new iPilot trolling motor with some new electronics. New seats as well.
I have some concerns:
1. I don't know if taking the weight of the motor off the back will make it sit funky in the water. If so, I'll just add some weight to the back hatch with something.
2. I don't yet know if I'll need a rudder of some sort in the back. I'm hoping having the trolling motor in the center of the bow, will be enough to have it trail true, but if not, I'll add a removable rudder of some sort.
Give my your thoughts on these issues.
I'll update as I progress. Thanks for looking.
Comment