Name sounds familiar. Probably know him if I saw him. There's too many darn Hudgins in this county to keep track of them all. Haha. If he lives in Cobbs Creek he probably lives near the Marina I keep my boat at. It's on Cobbs Creek Lane.

We grew up together down here at Gloucester Point. He moved up to Mathews about 20 years ago. I cant remember the name of his road....he works for Gloucester County, hangs out down at the marina on weekends...he can suck the bottom out of beer can faster than anyone!

Picked up a tandem axle trailer today. Needs some work but I only paid $200 for it. It's pretty solid other than some rust on the fenders and some of the hardware. Also needs some rollers and I'll probably replace the springs as they are pretty rusted. It's made by Calkins and seems to have a unique roller setup that I've never seen before. The guy I got it from bought it brand new and it was bought for his V-20. Unfortunately his boat got hung under a dock at low tide and sank so he has no need for the trailer any more. He said it was the easiest loading trailer he's ever owned so hopefully with just dumping a few bucks in it I'll have a nice trailer and I'll just sell Big Red. I'll post some pics soon.

I had a Calkins trailer that came with my Grady. If it has this roller setup check those u shaped frames for rust really well. The front one on mine was rotted bad from the inside out and cracked on me. Mine was also a 1980 model so it was to be expected I guess.

Had one of those once, yes the front tube was rotted out. Depends a lot on regular care.

Since he told me about it I googled them and see the U shaped bars you're talking about but this one isn't quite like that. It seems solid but I know rotting from the inside out isn't really something you can see. There's a couple brackets I may have to get fabbed up. Not sure if it was a good buy yet or not. Depends on what kind of money I have to put in it.

Well the more I inspect this thing the more I think I may have bought a $200 frame and axles. The bars that run across the trailer that pivot seem to have alot of rust on them. Most of the hardware is shot and the brackets holding the rollers seem to be FUBAR. Main problem is that you can't just buy parts for the trailer. Not sure how hard it'd be to make it a bunk trailer being that there isn't really any cross braces between the frame rails. Well we will see what happens, for now it can sit behind the shed til I figure it out.

Well looks like the powerhead will be coming off this weekend and headed to get rebuilt. It's gonna cost me around $2k for parts and labor and that's everything new (Pistons, bearings, rings, gaskets etc.). I don't think that's too bad especially with the reputation this guy has. I've asked all of my boating freinds about him and they've all said the same thing, the dude is awesome.

I do kind of wish a new 4-stroke was in the cards right now but it's just not. Right now I'm trying to make a huge business move that will set me and my family's future up and the last thing I need to do right now is put myself in more debt then I already have. But I know with this motor that this boat will absolutely fly. And with this guys reputation I shouldn't have any major issues in the future as long as I do my part in the maintenance routine. Now I'm debating on going ahead and pulling the whole motor off and getting the transom redone even though the glass man thinks it'll be fine for a couple years. It appears there is just a little moisture around the 2 bottom motor holes but I guess I may as well get it taken care of now.

I talked to TeeRoy yesterday, sounds like you finally got BB? I was in the same boat as you(see what I did there?) and have never regretted building my 2.4. Nothing like screaming around at 6000+

Sounds like you have a plan, if you have faith in the glass guy, I'd run the rebuilt motor a while before tackling the transom. That's the beauty of an outboard, only four bolts and a couple of quick disconnects holding it on.

On the trailer, looks like too many moving parts to me

Looking at the trailer I can see the problem instantly. You forget to hook up the engine and the driveshaft to the transmission....

Yea I called BB last week and never heard back so Troy got a hold of him yesterday for me. I can't wait!! I know she's gonna scream.

Still debating on the transom for now. Really it depends on the price he gives me which I'm still waiting for. Yes lots of moving parts on the trailer. I've read that they are nice loading trailers when they were new but this is far from new. Trying to figure out how to convert it to a bunk

That's what's wrong!!! Haha. Someone said "man that's a heck of a winch you got there". That's the new built TH350 I just picked up for my C-10 which I'm getting ready to sell to fund more boat projects. I never drive it anymore so might as well let someone else have some fun with her.

Sounds like you got a good engine man. If the glass man says run it that's what I would do.

That trailer looks like a medieval torture device. You did good on the price, would be worth having just to get rid of project hulls.

You'll see your C10 on Barrett Jackson in 20 years and wish you kept her.

Mike, we're supposed to pull the motor off this weekend at Troy's, you should ride out and check out the old girl.

My weekend is screwed up. Here is the plan. Boat Sat from 11-2:30pm. I have to be in for my nephews 6th Bday cookout at 3. Sunday I have to cart my 3 kids around and wont even get out. That said, if yall are working on it Sun I might be able to slide by.

Well it's been pretty humid so my glass guy is having alot of trouble getting my top as well as everything else he's working on done. I brought the boat home today and am going to yank the Merc off. Powerheads headed to get rebuilt and I'm going to go ahead and get the transom replaced. So when I get everything back and put together she'll be ready to slay some Stripers this fall.

Got some work done today. Boats back at the fiberglass man. Thinks maybe Wed he will start cutting into the transom. There is definitely moisture in there. I stuck a screwdriver into the lower bolt holes and could dig wet wood out pretty easily. It's a shame because according to the PO it was only done 2 years ago by a reputable Marina, but guess stuff happens. I don't think the rot will be spread far but I figure I might as well nip it in the bud now while I'm waiting to get the motor rebuilt.

And we have detachment.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...psnqqs4dtf.jpg

I figured I'd find all sorts of goodies when I pulled the aluminum plate off but it all looked pretty solid.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...pswikz5rwo.jpg

Motor hanging around. Tomorrow I'll have to snap a pic of my $20 engine stand I built. Probably the most over engineered stand built to date (by the way I'm not an engineer), but she definitely handle the monster well.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...psjvxqmwwn.jpg

Did some rearranging in my Photo Bucket which apparently changed the URL so all my pics are down. I'll get it back up soon. But anyways here's my $20 stand. Unbelievably sturdy.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...psicj85l8z.jpg

Great engine. Nice stand. Well done. :)

I can't wait to get this thing back together. It screamed with a hurt motor, I only can imagine what she'll do hitting on all 6. Got the powerhead off tonight. Hopefully that'll head to get rebuilt tomorrow. Taking some cash to the glass man tomorrow to get him going. Seems to be all coming together. :time: Knock on wood.

Not much of an update. Motors at the motor man. Boats still at the glass man. He cut the skin off the transom last night and on the starboard side he started at the top and when he got to the chine water began to run out. Made it sound like a substantial amount. He then went along the bottom of the hull cutting and said water just kept coming out. He hasn't got the skin free of the wood yet but he pulled the top away and the wood is definitely shot. It's delaminating like crazy and is flaky.

Supposed to get the skin off tonight and try and figure where all the water is from. He cut the port side all the way down to the plug first, and not a drop of water came out. Seems something made a sort of pocket in the starboard side that it collected in. Just praying when he gets it out that the stringers and foam are ok.

Ummmm ... What is he cutting? The inside or the outside skin? The transom has a curve to it.. slight, but it's there. That's why most that cut the skin cut the inside one to maintain the curve.

He's cutting the outside. I questioned this also and he assures me it will be right. Said he's done a bunch of V's. Said something about using 3 layers of 1/2" instead of 2 layers of 3/4 to get the curve back. We shall see. He guarantees his work for life as long as I don't go drilling holes in the transom so if something is wrong he will fix it.

hey squids, any chance u can get some photos. i know the guy doesn't want u hovering over him with a camera, but shots of whats under there might help some of us in the future.
thanks

Yea I'm supposed to get pics along the way.

Also got contacted today by the motor man. All looks well in the motor as far as the crank and block. He suggested new, oversized pistons. I told him he knows best and do whatever he wanted. Hopefully that'll be back together next week as well as my transom. Would love to have her in the water for Labor Day.

Well my glass guy has been feeling bad since it's been so hot so I went over to help get it going. Got the skin off and wow the smell. It was bad. Had some dry wood in high places but probably 85% was wet. It would seem someone put a full new transom with the 20" dropped area at some time. Then later someone put a section to build it up to hold the 25" motor.

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...pstd1c2vka.jpg
You can see the rectangle section at the top where they updated the transom to 25". The inner piece of wood was cut exactly to the shape of the dropped section. The the outer piece was cut a bit bigger to overlap the seam.

I suspect it's not the original transom as it was cut about 2" smaller than it needed to be. Then they had some sort of hard rubbery material filling the void from the edge of the wood and the side of the hull. None of the wood had been laminated together and the 2 sheets were put together with crown staples. I'm highly doubt that Wellcraft did that.

Now to the real disturbing findings. On the outside of the stringers where they connect to the transom there were holes cut through the inner skin. So any moisture that came to the stern on the outside of the stringers went right in the transom wood.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...ps55lfhgqz.jpg

Here you can kind of see the hole. This is the starboard side. What really sucks is this also let the moisture to seep into the stringer. But he doesn't think it made its way far into the stringer. Tomorrow he's going to cut a section out of the inner skin and investigate more. And he said it will also give him better access to tie the stringers into the new transom well.

Here's about 1/2 of the nastiness pulled out.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...ps2jwsjgrj.jpg

We got all the big stuff out. Tomorrow he's gonna let the rest of the wood residue dry out and hit it with the sander to clean up the skin. Then start putting it all back together. He's going to lay another layer of glass to the inner skin making sure it's sealed up from everything else. He also plans on making some passages from outside of the stringers into the bilge for any water to drain into the bilge instead of the transom.

Also in the 3rd pic you can see the 2 scupper tubes coming out and close to right in the middle you can see about a 1" diameter hole that was cut into the inner skin. This also would let any moisture into the transom. As well as the holes from the 20" motor weren't sealed up on the inside. Plenty of ways for moisture to enter the transom. But the glass guy guarantees it won't be that way again.

Wellcraft could have saved us all a lot of grief with a little more work. If they would have sealed the holes in the stringers with a little resin and glassed the top of the transom instead of the aluminum strips. But I guess they weren't built to go 30 something years.

Grinded the wood off the outer skin tonight. Gonna get the inner skin cleaned up tomorrow. It still had some wet spots and I figured that'd gum up the wheel pretty quickly. Should be dry by tomorrow evening. Then we will start glassing it all back together this weekend. My glass guy was working was another transom tonight glassing it all together and it's definitely more complicated then I thought it'd be. Glad I'm not going at this on my own that's for sure.

Got the inner skin cleaned up. I can't believe all the ways for water to get into the transom.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...psifqmjjbp.jpg

Was talking a bit to the glass guy and he noticed there were stress cracks in the gel coat on the corners of the transom. He believes the problem is that the 2 lower motor bolts are 4" higher than where the stringers connect to the transom. This is the bad thing about raising a 20" transom I guess.

He believes putting a couple knees in it will make it more than strong enough. We came up with a plan to run 2 knees from the transom down to tie into the stringers and the last bulkhead. I'll have to put a bit smaller hatch door to access the bilge but I can still have a 14"x24" opening so I think that's plenty. It mainly looked like the opening there was so long before because there was a battery shelf in there. We cut that out as well as the batteries are in the console now.

He dug into the stringers also and other than the last inch or so they are solid as a rock so that's good news.

Good news about the stringers.

Man it's been a while since the last update. Not much has happened. Power head is rebuilt and sitting at the shop waiting to get intstalled. Transom is getting wrapped up now. It was a bit more of a project than I had anticipated but none the less it should be done by weekends end.

We repaired the last 6" of stringers as that's the only place that had moisture, which came from the transom. We also built 1-1/2" thick knees from the top of the transom angled down and tied into the stringers and floor. This thing out of pop out the hole like nobody's business. The knees pretty much tie everything into the transom which in the future would make a transom repair much more of a PITA but plans are not to have to do it again. And like my glass man said, as long as he is the one to mount anything to the transom then he guarantees it for life.

I had someone interested in my T-top while it's been sitting there. I love the lack of maintenance needed to a stainless top however I feel for this boat the weight advantage would be nice to have aluminum. Got a quote for a new aluminum frame, cored hardtop with e-box mounded in and installed for $1800. Thinking if I can offset 1/2 the cost by selling mine I may go ahead and pull the trigger. Just for the heck of it I told the guy I wanted $1200 for mine. He's supposed to pass the message on and we will go from there. It's one of those things where mine works and is fine so selling it for less than what I want is pointless. I'll stick with it for a while before I'd give it away.

In other news it's seems I destroyed the foot on my motor when we made our test ride. My buddy felt some play in the lower unit and told me he thought something was wrong. Well I pulled the plug and not a drop of oil came out and the magnet plug is covered in large metal junks. Why the hell I didn't check the oil before taking it is beyond me. Bonehead move on my part.

But today I picked up a parts motor. I got a 1999 150 Merc complete for $300. I mostly was interested because of the newer style cowling that's in good shape other than some sun fade. The foot was off the motor. The guy that had it hauled a boat off of someone's property so he knew nothing about it. The water pump was removed so I was thinking maybe the pump went, hurt the motor and they removed it to investigate. Or so I hoped. But when I went to pick it up his dad was there and said he was told the lower unit was junk and that's why they parked it. Which means I don't have a good foot but I'm hoping maybe the PH is fine and I can wheel and deal with a buddy of mine for a good foot. We shall see. But all the electronics seem in good shape, tilt/trim works and cowlings good so I feel I still did well for $300. I'll post pics of the score in the morning.

Here's my $300 parts motor. Haven't had a chance to do a comp test. If that turns out ok I may go ahead and try to get it running. That'd be a sweet deal
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...ps4a0sowa0.jpg

Went ahead and put the cowling on my motor. Thought I'd have to change the mounts but it lined right up. Probably gonna put a fresh coat of paint on it soon. Though keeping the 150 decals on it would be funny while blowing by some bigger boats. Can't wait to see what the 200's gonna do.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...psc2biyjhs.jpg

I like that cowl. I've got the same engine, so I may have to try to find one for myself. You're gonna love that 200 on your boat. Sweet engine. Perfect combination. :beer:

Before cowl:

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a49...llcraft030.jpg

After newer style, and no, that's not a 135 under there heh, heh, heh!

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a49...topti005-1.jpg



Glad to hear the progress, sounds like she is coming together

Well we planned on having the transom wrapped up this weekend but that didn't happen. Starting to get irritated now. My engine guy has been patiently waiting for the boat but I'm sure his patience is running low. Kinda wish I'd just tackled this on my own.

But anyways while I've been waiting I found some bad news about the parts motor I got. The lower unit is bad. The motor would probably run but has 75-80 psi per cylinder. Good sign nothing is tore up in the motor, just needs freshened up. Still, for $300 I think I did well. The cowlings, working tilt/trim and all the other spare parts I got are well worth $300.

I tried to clean up the hood yesterday but my plans to keep the misleading 150hp decals came to an end. It looked terrible once I cleaned them up. So I just took them off with a heat gun and eraser wheel then buffed the hood and lower cowlings. Of course the top is still faded but it looks much better. I still will probably paint it but this will hold me over for the time being.

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...pstx0o7t9z.jpg

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...pslolno28g.jpg

Looking at that picture with the black cowl like that and for some reason all I kept hearing in my mind was "Luke, I am your father".... :you:

My nekkid etecs make me think of stormtroopers.

Well been a while but progress is being made. I have had the motor guy on hold now for over a month. I offered to bring him the boat to hang the motor and run it and he kept insisting I get the transom 100% done first. Well I finally just told the fiberglass guy enough is enough, I got to get the boat back. So today we kinda slapped it all back together and hopefully tomorrow I will get the motor hung.

Unfortunately I'll have to take the motor back off and redo a lot of what was done today. The transom itself is fine, just mostly cosmetics in the splash well. I just needed it back together. I was warned the glass guy was good but took a long time but I didn't think it'd be over 2 months. I can see if he had other projects he had to finish first but he started mine soon as I took it there. All well. It'll get done. It was just nice seeing the transom part done. He sprayed it with a thick coat of gel-coat that'll need sanded and buffed of course but that can wait.

Also I have a guy interested in buying my T-top, which still hasn't had the hardtop repairs done. He wants to buy it as is for 3/4 of what I can get a new custom aluminum framed, cored hardtop with built in E-box T-top installed on the boat. Soon as he shows me the cash I may go ahead and pull the trigger on that.

Here's a couple pics I took tonight. You can see the lack of prep in the splash well but the fact she is coming home tomorrow morning is all I care about.

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...pswsdnbmya.jpg

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...ps4cnpnfdn.jpg

I've learned that fiberglass shops are good places to get free boat storage, often times multiple years worth. Be careful of the hatch in the splash well, potential sinking hazard. A foam roller at least would have been nice of him. I like the transom knees.