kerno

I'm not a big supporter of the JoeBoater concept. I think naming an internet site is a lot like naming a book. Once the book is on the rack (or the forum posted on the internet) the potential customer makes a lot of the decision to buy or enter based on the title. JoeBoater just doesn't prompt any interest. Reel Boating, especially with the logo split, does sound interesting. I'd click on SeriousBoating long before I'd click on JoeBoating.

I don't see the buy button either and I'd like an XL....... I see the Bikini Island button, but they're not wearing t-shirts!

It is something you should NEVER do, 'cause it makes the keys all sticky.

Truly an icon!

Lots of different opinions here, If you are not commercial and both the truck and trailer are registered out of state, I would not expect to be ticketed for the number of axles with brakes. Again, the operative word is expect. It is up to the guy with the badge. Do you have enough truck? Yeah, you have enough to pull two of them. Should you hire a guide and rent instead? No, unless you are happy to know the meter is running while you explore an interesting looking cove or decide to take a nap. About the trailer: I've seen more problems as a result of recent work done than from going as is. Those folks who take the car to the dealer for pre-vacation service are tempting fate to me. I'd jack up each axle and spin the wheels. Unless they are growling, I'd leave the bearings and seals alone. Take an infrared thermometer and make sure the lead tire on each side of the trailer is up to the task. I usually run one load range higher on the front axle, because it is that axle that gets to heave the trailer up and over the potholes at the edge of bridges. Two spares sounds like overkill, but I've been there. One of them can be anything that holds air, but I took out two tires when the winch handle fell off in Slidell, LA on a Sunday morning at 5 am. No one sells trailer tires in Slidell on Sunday morning. I've towed coast to coast several times and never needed a bearing, but have used the temp gun at every stop. I've re-adjusted bearings on several new trailers because they were set up too tight, but never had any other problem with a bearing that was quiet at the beginning of a trip. Here's 12,000 pounds of boat and trailer behind an F-250 2WD on its way from Florida to California.

The idea of going over a hundred in an open boat sounds completely nuts, but is probably one of the most fun things you'll ever do. I found the area between about 90 and 125 to be the most impressive and a couple good passes on early morning water can be enough of an adrenaline rush that you'll still be shaky and hour later. Over a buck and a quarter, it just staples the goggles harder on you face, but does not feel much different. It is the magic point where the boat is high enough that you can't feel the water anymore that you'll be grinning like an idiot or scared sh*tless! You're talking about doing this with a big single on a jackplate, so based on my experience, you're going to find that your best speed is going to be made with the engine so high that almost the entire bullet is out of the water and you'll be running on only about 40 percent of the prop diameter. You'll have the plate down for the leave, bringing it up as you go. You may work the trim in the early part of the pass, but the big end is mostly jackplate. The word "rake" is really going to be a part of your prop vocabulary! Here's the spooky part: As the engine gets higher, your ability to steer the boat gets lower. With twins, you steer with the throttle, but on a single, the blades are trying to drag the tail of the boat sideways, while the prop thrust is pushing forward. So, as you go faster, you have to correct by adding more steering and you add it gradually as you go. But the boat will slow down a lot faster than it will accelerate and that's where it get tricky. If you back off too fast, the corrections you've made will become over corrections and the boat will try to jink to the side. It is one thing if you are fighting just the lack of steering from having so little prop and lower unit in the water and another thing if the motor is adding to the fun by flexing the 14 inches of stacked plates. I've had great luck with the Stainless Marine plates because I think they are the toughest ones out there. If I were rigging your boat and faced with the engine sitting in a recess in the transom, I'd make a welded and heat treated aluminum spacer "bracket" that is 8 inches thick and has a 3/4 plate on the transom that comes close to matching the transom recess. It would have a large hole cut out in the center to bring the lines through but would have beefy side plates supporting a gusseted 3/4 plate that the jack plate bolts to. It would not be movable or adjustable. Once you get it fitted to the hull, it should be powdercoated and go on with 4200 and at least 8 bolts to distribute the load. Th top half of the plate is under tension. Think of clamping the bracket in a giant vise and hanging the boat from it. That's what happens at speed. The bottom of the bracket is tying to push through the transom and the top is trying to pull loose. So, lotsa bolts at the top, not so many at the bottom. You'll also want a doubler plate inside the transom to distribute the load of the bolts. If the transom plate is 3/4, the doubler should be as well. To me, this kind of speed requires a foot throttle. Your arms can't react fast enough with the long throw of a lever and you'll need both hands for steering, trim and jackplate. Both he trim and the jackplate should be on paddles behind the wheel. Wheel mounted switches are common, but if you have the wheel turned 180, you can hit the wrong switch. I've tried foot switches for trim and jack, but while your right foot works great for the gas, teaching your left foot to work switches does not work well if you have to think about what you want it to do. You'll need some personal rigging as well. Ordinary jackets don't cut it at speed. You don't need a chute jacket, but you are going to want at least a Lifeline jacket rated for 100 mph. They don't come apart on impact and they have crotch straps so they don't come off over your head. I've got several of them, so if you wear about a 46 jacket, I can help. I understand your dislike of the stacked plates. I had a similar problem, on my Talon and I solved it by making the engine mounting arms and the jackplate all one unit. I used the cylinder and the slide bearings of Stainless Marine plates and machined everything out of the solid.

14 inches is a whole bunch of setback for a heavy or high horsepower jackplate. It looks like the higher setback jackplates have triangulation or plates on them to stop them from moving from side to side, but even then you are going to be putting some serious torque loads on the transom. At anything over 80 mph, I'd rather see a 4 inch setback jackplate mounted on a 10 inch bracket that had a larger foot print so the localized forces were better distributed. A little side to side engine movement at 50 is annoying, but at a 100 it can cause the boat to chine faster than you can correct it. Knocking down chine walk is "interesting". If you happen to be correcting starboard and the boat is moving to port, you're OK, but if your steering and the chine walk are both going the same way at the same time, it is very easy to "fall out" of the boat. Here's a shot of a 25 DCB with a fabricated bracket that does a decent job of spreading the load over the transom. It does not have jackplates, but look at the stern shot and you'll get the idea: http://www.powerboatlistings.com/view/6840

Mount a terminal strip with four terminals on it near the front of the trailer. Run your trailer wiring to one side of the terminal strip and put tab terminals on the other side of the strip. Then make a pigtail harness with your plug on one end and slip on sockets on the other end. It connects and disconnects very quickly and has the added advantage of separating without damage if you forget to unhook the wiring when you park the trailer or someone trips over the wires. Make a spare pigtail to keep in the truck and you'll be right back in business if you do forget to take it off and someone steals it. If you've ever had he plug come out and drag on the ground, you'll love how easy it is to replace. Having the terminal block there also makes trailer light trouble shooting a lot easier.

I am on my second trailer with Kodiak discs and I can tell you my third trailer will have them as well. I set them up with the BrakeRite electric over hydraulic actuator and could not be happier with how well the system works. You can actually control the braking!

I have dealt with Gary. He does seem to have a line of quite a few Intrepids, but he can be "different" to deal with. You have my number, so give me a call and we'll talk about how to deal with him. He can get the job done and if the boat is what you are looking for, it is a shame to walk away because you are uncomfortable with Gary's manner. You always need to remember that you are the buyer and without you, nothing happens. As long as you lead, the deal can follow.

My main objection to the nylon line is not that it will break, but that it also serves as the "bannister rail" for the ladder as you board. If the boat is pitching, the line can go slack, which is not a good thing when you are off balance and have a lot of weight high on your back.

THe ones I looked at were all center consoles, so my wiring access concerns may be limited to the consoles. But I just did not see a good way to access the back of the instruments and electronics. My last 3 boats all had large removable panels which exposed the entire backside of the console. That makes things like autopilot installations a lot easier.

Guys, I have to take the other side on this one. I am very impressed with how Intrepid builds their boats. They are on the forefront of both engineering and materials. However (and it is a big "however") a lot of their design work is not my favorite. Many of the models have small swmsteps that appear to be added onto the transom and are only accssable through a rather small door. Yeah, some boats have the dive door, but as a diver, I am really not impressed by a door that relies on nylon line to keep it in place while 300 pounds of diver and gear perches on it in a pitching sea. The deck is a mass of hatches and drain channels, which I might forgive because it offers good drainage, but drop anything and it disappears into a groove. The thing that bothers me the most is the wiring. It is very well done from the factory, but once the boat is assembled, there is almost no access to the wiring in the console area. If you want to chage electronics or find a short, you better have long arms and tough fingers. Just for the heck of it, look at what it would take to replace a steering hose. They still have a waiting list, but I feel the boats are sold more on their surprise and delight features like electric sliding doors and rotating heads than real boating function. The anchor lockers are too small for real ground tackle, but you'll find more 30 footers with bow thrusters than you will with a windlass. They are a boat that impresses everyone, no matter where you go. But my personal feeling is that they are more suited to a cocktail cruise than cleaning up the blood from a bleeding tuna. There are so many nooks and crannies on the boats that cleaning one properly could be a tough task. I still like the boats and came very close to buying one myself. But the plushness lost out to open decks, less upholstery and better wiring access. It is all a matter of personal preference.

The only reason I don't own one is that I am waiting for a 33 footer! Great boats, well thought out and hulls that give both a good ride and retrun good fuel numbers, That is a very tough thing to accomplish!

I'm no expert on this, but I think the successful lawsuits have been against the refiners and distributors for not providing ethanol free fuel for boats. I believe the ethanol is federally mandated for passenger cars. The boaters in Hawaii sued the refiners. not the state, and got ethanol free fuel in some of the marinas.

It's about time a boat owner came out on top in Florida! Now if they just convict the perps!

I'm pretty sure that some states, like Florida, require them. I use 2 inch wide race car tiedowns. You can buy 10,000 pound straps on eBay for about $20.00 each. They WILL keep the boat and trailer together.

The windlass can see a tremendous amount of force if a wave passes under the hull and the anchor is stuck. For that reason, unless the foredeck is stromng enough, it will crack under stress. If the foredeck is strong enough, mount a horzontal windlass right behind the bow roller. If not, you'll need to mount a sturdy plate in the anchor locker and mount a roller at the aft end of the bow roller to feed the rode ever the edge and to the windlass. You don't have an easy installation!

Bluewater: I looked at them in detail at the Miami show this year and was very impressed with what I saw. The fit and finish, construction techniques, underdeck access, battery access and all the things that make life easy with a boat were there. I did not get a chance to demo one in rough water, but from looking at the hull, it should work properly. I personally feel stepped bottoms are over-rated in the real world. The water is seldom flat enough to be able to make the speeds required to use them when you are in a 28 foot boat. Step or no steps would not play into my decision. Looking at the four boats you've listed and what you plan to do with it, I'd rate them as follows: Bluewater 1st, SeaVee a close second. Contender third and Interpid fourth. I cannot honestly rank the SeaCraft because I have not been on a new one. If I were buying any of the above, I'd buy the Contender and SeaVee new, while trying to find a decent used Bluewater or Intrepid. That's based on price, initial depreciation and anticipated resale.

Looking at your list, let's take them one at a time: Contender, Intrepid, Sea Vee, Sea Craft and Blue Water. Contender is a very popular boat. They've made lots of them and they have a solid following. They are first and foremost, a fish boat. THey are designed and marketed to serious fisherman and are short on decoration and extras like a head. Their resale is tempered by the sheer number of them out there. The boats are built to function and they do. The ride is decent and the boats are light enough to get reasonable mileage. Intrepid is a very expensive boat that used state of the art fabrication techniques and is one of the few boats that are still built to order. I don't know the current wait to get one, but it used to be over a year. The intrepid line caters to a high end buyer and you'll find things like electric seats, lots of soft trim, and lots of suprise ad delight features to amaze the cocktail cruisers. They can be fished, but as you can see from the layout and the mess a bloody tuna would make that they are not a "fishing first" boat. The ride is decent, but they can be wet. Space for ground tackle and large live wells? Wrong brand of boat. But almost al of them have heads and a lot of them have bow thrusters. Access to the swim platform is not good. Some have the "dive door", which looks great in the ads, but is not something I'd want to face with dive gear on when the boat is pitching. The boats are heavy, so they ride well, but they don't carry the strakes far enough forward to make them into spray rails. The sides of the bow are very smooth, which means that withou anything to turn the water over and knock it down, you'll be wearing it when it is windy. SeaVee: Well made boat. Good attention to detail with wiring that looks like it should. A good boat that never seems to be as strong a seller as it should be. Well designed for fishing and has no major failings in the sizes you are looking at. SeaCraft. I have not looked at them in a while and was not impressed with the fit and finish when I looked them over closely. They may have improved, but I cannot make a current comment on them. Out of space, so continued in the next post:

Go to a body shop supply store and buy a tube of 3M trim adhesive. It will cost you about $6.00 and the stuff does stick!

I'd hold out more hope, but even Scientific American called it a fraud a few years ago. I knew we were in trouble when both McCain and Obama were singing the praises of ethanol in the campaign. ADM is bigger than we are. We can buy it from Brazil for less than it costs us to make it, but like sugar, it is taxed beyond reason.

I'd go with the larger pitch. As Ken noted, they get smaller in diameter as the pitch goes up, so they have a bit more slip in them. Strangely enough, I found the Yamaha SWS worked better up to about 3500, with better bite and better fuel numbers. But over that, the Enertias worked the best and gave a higher top end because of the thinner blades. In theory, the X-7 alloy should be tougher, but the blades are also thinner, so I would not bet that an Enerta would outlive a Yamaha prop in the ding test.

When you order the sender, order a spare. They are not expensive, but they do tend to die.

You don't need a stinking Y valve if you plumb it right. The Macerating pump is a Whale Gulper and our bandit friends at West carry the charcoal vent filter. They also carry the Whale. You can use a second Jabsco 1 inch macerator, but they are slower and don't have the one way valves the Whale does. With the Whale, it can be hooked into the pump out line and as long as the seacock is closed, they can vac out the tank with no problem or you can turn the pump on and pump it overboard.