Evan's boat projects: The next chapter

You'll be glad you pulled all new wiring. In the 90's a fishing buddy and I went partners on a 32' Uniflite flybridge that was plagued with electrical problems, owner so tired of dealing with them he sold us the boat way reasonable..we pulled all new wiring, new circuit breaker panels, etc...worth every hour, never had a problem again. Shudder when I think what running those twin 318's to the tuna grounds and back would cost these days
 
Fresh dash panels (2 of 3) done. Not sure about the bottom one, that may wait until this winter when I do another round of work. I plan to replace the circuit breaker/switches, but this one is working for now. The stereo doesn't work but I'm leaving it so I don't have a big hole there.

Boat is ready to party at this point. Just need an opportunity to take it down to the launch on the Columbia a few miles away. Might do it in the rain this weekend which will give me the place to myself.

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Evan B said:
Gonna freshen up some of the plastics :) had them custom cut at Tap Plastics in Portland. Was much cheaper than I anticipated. Dash panel will need two more holes but wanted to place them after I put it up and decide where I want those gauges.

especially excited about the flush mount Garmin chartplotter
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Have you cut the plastics your self? I'm thinking about redoing the wood panels on my boat and would do all the cutting myself since they are 500+ from the factory , and still needed to be trimmed for updates?
 
ThatGuyRyRy said:
Have you cut the plastics your self? I'm thinking about redoing the wood panels on my boat and would do all the cutting myself since they are 500+ from the factory , and still needed to be trimmed for updates?
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Tap Plastics in Portland (looks like they have one up in Seattle, Bellevue and Lynnwood as well) did all the cutting. I sent them measurements and where I wanted the cutouts and they did it all, and for a LOT less than I anticipated. Like $20 or so per panel. Labor ends up costing more than the materials, so the more cutting you do, the more they run. Worth looking in to: https://www.tapplastics.com/
 
Evan B said:
Tap Plastics in Portland (looks like they have one up in Seattle, Bellevue and Lynnwood as well) did all the cutting. I sent them measurements and where I wanted the cutouts and they did it all, and for a LOT less than I anticipated. Like $20 or so per panel. Labor ends up costing more than the materials, so the more cutting you do, the more they run. Worth looking in to: https://www.tapplastics.com/
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Are you using the full marine plastics?
 
ThatGuyRyRy said:
Are you using the full marine plastics?
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Depends on which piece. I had them make a bunch of different things for me. The dash panel with the instruments/helm is ABS sheet, the flush mount chartplotter piece is HDPE (high density PE aka starboard). Then I had some small rectangle pieces for covering up holes along the rails the previous owner used for some stupid flag holders which are the HDPE. Also had some Acetal GEHR cut as a backing plate.
 
Regarding your issue with the offset. I would look at the original motor and the mounting bracket. In some cases there is an intentional offset as to where the motor bracket mounts to the transom resulting with the motor actually being centered.. This offset allows room for cables and steering linkage to run without the risk of pinching during a tight turns. I would bet that the old Johnson motor itself was actually centered when mounted with an offset bracket, otherwise the flow of water exiting the hull at speed would have compromised motor performance and vessel handling.
 
Jim Allen said:
Regarding your issue with the offset. I would look at the original motor and the mounting bracket. In some cases there is an intentional offset as to where the motor bracket mounts to the transom resulting with the motor actually being centered.. This offset allows room for cables and steering linkage to run without the risk of pinching during a tight turns. I would bet that the old Johnson motor itself was actually centered when mounted with an offset bracket, otherwise the flow of water exiting the hull at speed would have compromised motor performance and vessel handling.
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Yeah, that's what my research indicated as well. But my Honda with the modern SeaStar steering wouldn't fit that far over without having to cut the splashwell. So I got it as close as I could to where it was and what appears to be center. We'll see how it all goes. If it seems like adjustments need to be made, then I'll make adjustments. That mount just isn't very wide, though, so it'd take mods to move it back over any further than it is.

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Evan B said:
Yeah, that's what my research indicated as well. But my Honda with the modern SeaStar steering wouldn't fit that far over without having to cut the splashwell. So I got it as close as I could to where it was and what appears to be center. We'll see how it all goes. If it seems like adjustments need to be made, then I'll make adjustments. That mount just isn't very wide, though, so it'd take mods to move it back over any further than it is.

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Without a doubt a custom job to retrofit everything. You are doing an excellent job. That 225 will push you across the water quite nicely. The biggest issue will be to watch for cavitation or "the Bernoulli effect" at speed which can starve the outboard from the water it need to suction to cool the motor. Less likely to be of issue here as compared to you previous modification as that hull was not built to function with an outboard.
 
Jim Allen said:
Without a doubt a custom job to retrofit everything. You are doing an excellent job. That 225 will push you across the water quite nicely. The biggest issue will be to watch for cavitation or "the Bernoulli effect" at speed which can starve the outboard from the water it need to suction to cool the motor. Less likely to be of issue here as compared to you previous modification as that hull was not built to function with an outboard.
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Previous boat had no issue with it at all. I follow the formula for the level of the cavitation plate in relation to the bottom of hull vs the distance from the stern.

Hopefully I'll know this weekend.
 
Evan B said:
Previous boat had no issue with it at all. I follow the formula for the level of the cavitation plate in relation to the bottom of hull vs the distance from the stern.

Hopefully I'll know this weekend.
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That's awesome. So many others would have just slapped the outboard on without consideration of fluid dynamics. This is even more critical when running an outboard with a jet pump on the lower unit. looking forward to watching your build.
 
Well today was a big day!
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Started off by dropping the boat in the water so I could adjust the trailer rollers. Fired up the engines while I did it to let them run a while. I'd rather if there was any problems with the fuel lines or anything I found out at the dock vs out in the Columbia. Anyways, the rollers. Easy enough right? Not so much. After 45mins of trying to line up the bolts to get this set back up, I had to call the wife down to help. Not a one person job.
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Finally got that all finished up with some help. Glad that's over.


Now the boat. While pulling away from the dock, I noticed something I didn't notice while testing at home: I somehow reversed the hydraulic hoses for the steering! So left was right and right was left. I figured since I was the only one out there, I could make this work for the one trip.

Boat ran great with a top speed of 45mph. Still have things to sort out like the steering. Also can't get my Garmin GFS-10 fuel flow meter to read for some reason. I brought it over on all the same fuel lines it was on before. So just need to triple check all my electrical connections.

Still work to do, but it's finally usable and fishable. The hydraulic hoses deal is about a 5min fix. After that, it's getting the other boat ready for the market and then on to getting my new anchor caddy installed, plus some custom pieces for my gunnels, and possibly a floor box or two around the captain's seat.
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SurfnFish said:
45 is booking on a boat like that...imagine the GPH ramps up quickly
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I'll know once my fuel flow sensor is working 😂

On the previous boat of mine, which was heavier, this engine got like 3.5-4mpg cruising at like 30mph. Which really is pretty decent.
 
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