Thread: Rookie mistakes

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  1. Member
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    #241
    I'm a younger guy and don't have much experience with older motors. My prior experience with engines is "turn the key, it works immediately". A few months ago I got a 1987 Ranger 375v with a same year Yamaha Pro V 150. The first couple of times I took the boat out I had a hell of a time firing the motor. I was so worried that something was wrong with it. I would turn the key and it would sputter and die. It was only later that I realized older carbureted motors are quirky and need specific cold start procedures. I wish I knew that before, I was freaking out something bad happened like water got into the tanks and engine that I literally drained 15 gallons of gas out and added new gas. Lesson learned.

    I think some other people above said it best. Don't rush, don't panic. I thought I had a bad situation, panicked, and ended up me costing time and money.

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    #242
    Quote Originally Posted by FishInTheDesert View Post
    almost burnt my boat down yesterday for not taking care of the birds nest of wires the previous owner left. Burning wires and full gas tanks=NO BUENO
    I just completely rewired the used boat i purchased for this exact reason...a boat fire scares the living heck out of me. Especially because i fish remote cold water.

    This thread makes me a feel a heck of a lot better about myself...lets see...

    Too many times ive taken off with the trolling motor still down in the water...in my smaller boat my and my buddy both went to the same side of the tinner at the same time and we flipped him into 45 degree water an hour away from home during a snowstorm...not a good scene.

    Was driving the boat in the rain and my cell phone rang, went to take it out of my chest pocket and the moisture caused both my fishing license card and boaters license card to stick to my phone...pulled it out and watched both of my licenses fly into the lake.

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    #243
    Quote Originally Posted by AKRISONER View Post
    I just completely rewired the used boat i purchased for this exact reason...a boat fire scares the living heck out of me. Especially because i fish remote cold water.

    This thread makes me a feel a heck of a lot better about myself...lets see...

    Too many times ive taken off with the trolling motor still down in the water...in my smaller boat my and my buddy both went to the same side of the tinner at the same time and we flipped him into 45 degree water an hour away from home during a snowstorm...not a good scene.

    Was driving the boat in the rain and my cell phone rang, went to take it out of my chest pocket and the moisture caused both my fishing license card and boaters license card to stick to my phone...pulled it out and watched both of my licenses fly into the lake.
    yea. Im actually really thankful it happened....the way it did. I was thankfully back at the dock after running 20-30 minutes back there....had the frying (not 100% sure there was fire but LOTS of smoke) started while I was running I would not have seen or smelt it....and it was all happening right next to a 90% full gas tank....couldve been lots worse.

    Any tips on where I should start when it comes to rewiring? Just started googling yesterday and its intimidating...i hope I can tackle it myself. Rigged my own TM...but thats basically plug and play and running a few wires.

    This thread has saved me from taking off with TM still deployed...definitely seen that happen to plenty of people in here so now I always check lol

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    #244
    Quote Originally Posted by AKRISONER View Post
    I just completely rewired the used boat i purchased for this exact reason...a boat fire scares the living heck out of me. Especially because i fish remote cold water.

    This thread makes me a feel a heck of a lot better about myself...lets see...

    Too many times ive taken off with the trolling motor still down in the water...in my smaller boat my and my buddy both went to the same side of the tinner at the same time and we flipped him into 45 degree water an hour away from home during a snowstorm...not a good scene.

    Was driving the boat in the rain and my cell phone rang, went to take it out of my chest pocket and the moisture caused both my fishing license card and boaters license card to stick to my phone...pulled it out and watched both of my licenses fly into the lake.
    What the hell is a boaters license?

  5. Member 76Champ's Avatar
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    #245
    Lots of states requires boaters to take safety course to get a license to operate a marine vessel. i wish they ALL did and everyone had to get one.
    -Justin
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    #246
    Quote Originally Posted by Huntfishnc View Post
    Beach the boat on the bank (not nearly far enough). While getting the truck, the boat current drifts the boat out into the middle of the lake in very frigid waters. (Ask me how I know)
    Been there...Is it still a "rookie" mistake when it happens twice???

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    #247
    Quote Originally Posted by Zoomworms View Post
    Opened the livewell lid to admire my 5 fish limit, Had a bass eject itself out straight into the lake. Only weighed in 4 that day.
    Been here done that and still won the tournament.

  8. Member
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    #248
    Quote Originally Posted by exx1976 View Post
    What the hell is a boaters license?
    in Canada a "pleasure craft operators card" is a requirement in order to drive any motorized or wind driven vessel.

    Had to take a boaters exam which included identifying various types of navigation markers and understanding right of way requirements. Its actually a pretty good idea so that you dont have idiots jumping on jet skis ripping 1000 miles per hour ignoring clear navigation markers etc.

    FISHINGTHEDESERt im glad to hear you got away with everything ok...

    If i were you I would start with easy part...first tip...over guage your wire. Thin wire leads to heat which leads to a mess. Look up your recommended line guage for your electronics and run all new wires with fuses. Then your trolling motor dont run anything under 8 guage wire and again put a good fuse on it. Your main electronics running to your breaker panel should be one line of good guage wire...the more you can avoid 10000 lines being attached to a battery the better. I also suggest using a battery terminal that allows you to minimize the numbers of connections required. keep your wires clean and straight, dont let them cross over each other everywhere.

    my battery connections for everything are really straight forward

    1 line to the fuse panel, one line for one set of electronics and one more line for my next set of electronics and then one line for each livewell. They all feed out the same direction off of the battery and are taped together. they then meet up with all of the taped together ground lines and all get tucked into one big piece of wire loom. everything has way heavier guage than necessary and everything has fuses on it. as long as things come out straight off of the battery and dont require crazy bends to come together run them into a line and tape them together so that they dont get folded up and start breaking etc. Wire loom is your friend.

  9. Member
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    #249
    Quote Originally Posted by .44mag View Post
    Okay I did it. I left my motor down yesterday as I pulled the boat out up the ramp. scrapped about an 1/8 of an inch off. I wasn't paying attention so mad at myself about it. Will this affect any thing? Yeah I'm new to bass boats never had a boat with over a 20 hp motor before so I've been trying to be careful and learn, learned that one the hard way always trim up at the dock and ramp.
    I did that at the ramp. I asked a friend if he thought I should get it fixed. He said nah, that's called maturity....

  10. Member
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    #250
    me and my son had fished a tournament on saturday about 80 miles away. we got home about six oclock and had to turn the boat and tackle around as we had to leave before 4 am the next morning for another tournament about 100 miles away. i had changed props and didn't like they way it ran so i switched back to my raker w/the tbx prop. we got to the lake and i decided to put in at a landing on the south end of the lake and put in. he parked the truck and i picked him up - when i got deep enough to hit it, it just spun. it took me about 30 seconds to figure out what i did. we got the boat on the trailer - it was 45 degrees and i was in the water pushing it on - i verified that i had left the insert out of the prop and immediately called my buddy. he went to my house got the insert and i met him about half way - we ended up losing 2 hours on the water.
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    #251
    Quote Originally Posted by chrisalecia View Post
    I did that at the ramp. I asked a friend if he thought I should get it fixed. He said nah, that's called maturity....
    LOL. Yeah I now remember that there are 4 trim buttons on my boat the back, the throttle lever, the steering wheel and at the front.
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  12. Member Redneckgearhead's Avatar
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    #252
    I recently purchased my first boat, until then I had never driven a boat that I didn't have to paddle. The ice finally went out a few weeks ago so I had to get the boat on the water. I asked my wife to come with and pull the trailer out of the water after I got the boat in, as the docks were not in that lake yet. I put the plug in, unhooked the transom straps and hooked a long line to the bow eye and unhooked the winch rope from the bow eye, it's a roller trailer... I started to back down and stopped to double check the plug, that's when I noticed my mistake.... the boat had rolled about 12-18 inches back on the trailer, thankfully the line I put on the bow eye had gotten tangled on the winch handle and it stopped. I almost dumped my boat on the ground the very first time I took it out.

  13. Member Hez's Avatar
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    #253
    Quote Originally Posted by Redneckgearhead View Post
    I recently purchased my first boat, until then I had never driven a boat that I didn't have to paddle. The ice finally went out a few weeks ago so I had to get the boat on the water. I asked my wife to come with and pull the trailer out of the water after I got the boat in, as the docks were not in that lake yet. I put the plug in, unhooked the transom straps and hooked a long line to the bow eye and unhooked the winch rope from the bow eye, it's a roller trailer... I started to back down and stopped to double check the plug, that's when I noticed my mistake.... the boat had rolled about 12-18 inches back on the trailer, thankfully the line I put on the bow eye had gotten tangled on the winch handle and it stopped. I almost dumped my boat on the ground the very first time I took it out.

    Wishin' I was fishin'...


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  14. Member
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    #254
    Left TM down.
    Better than that, came back to nice marina/dock area after fishing. See a few fish playing around the docks so I put TM down and cast a few. No bites so I drift to a dock, back my trailer in and proceed to load boat with TM still down. Getting out of your normal routine causes errors. That TM was underpowered anyway.
    I have drug the skeg. you know you have done a good job when it is so wedged it doesn't want to trim up
    My boathouse is about a mile from the ramp. We pull the fishing boat every spring and clean it and put it back in. Of course we pull the plug and I was sure to put it back in firmly...in the live well hole. Of course, since we had just cleaned the boat I didn't put any life jackets back in. That one almost got good. I was being nice to my dog and took him with me on that ride, some friend.

    My most recent: I am bringing the boat out this year for it's cleaning. I normally trailer a V-Drive boat, so I was worried I would forget to raise the motor. The whole ride I am telling myself raise the motor, raise the motor. Well I did and was so preoccupied with that that I left the switch on and killed the battery for the next trip. Anytime you can fix something with a battery charger, it is a good day though.

  15. Member
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    #255
    I have been a boat novice for over 20 years now, lol I can screw up with the best of them!

    I have:

    Left plug out multiple times and each time wondering why water coming up from floor drain.
    Took off with trolling motor down, this is the most fun when night fishing!
    Pulled up trolling motor and cranked up and took off with forgetting to pull anchor which is now bouncing behind boat.
    Bounced rods out to never be seen again.
    Cussed motor for two hours because wouldn’t start with kill switch off and on lifejacket.
    Trolling motor quit working for no reason and went home before I knew it had inline breaker that just needed reset.
    Backed boat into garage too far and put skeg into door going into house.
    Took off with battery charger bouncing down driveway.
    The best for me was I was losing water from livewells when running so I wanted to see if still happening one day so decided to reach back and open livewell lid at 60 mph. The resulting wind tornado sucked my hat and glasses off. I recovered my hat but lost my prescription eyeglasses and couldnt see crap driving back to ramp or home. That was dumb and suprised it didn't rip off livewell lid.

  16. Member Hez's Avatar
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    #256
    Quote Originally Posted by DaveTTN View Post
    I have been a boat novice for over 20 years now, lol I can screw up with the best of them!

    I have:

    Left plug out multiple times and each time wondering why water coming up from floor drain.
    Took off with trolling motor down, this is the most fun when night fishing!
    Pulled up trolling motor and cranked up and took off with forgetting to pull anchor which is now bouncing behind boat.
    Bounced rods out to never be seen again.
    Cussed motor for two hours because wouldn’t start with kill switch off and on lifejacket.
    Trolling motor quit working for no reason and went home before I knew it had inline breaker that just needed reset.
    Backed boat into garage too far and put skeg into door going into house.
    Took off with battery charger bouncing down driveway.
    The best for me was I was losing water from livewells when running so I wanted to see if still happening one day so decided to reach back and open livewell lid at 60 mph. The resulting wind tornado sucked my hat and glasses off. I recovered my hat but lost my prescription eyeglasses and couldnt see crap driving back to ramp or home. That was dumb and suprised it didn't rip off livewell lid.
    Sounds like you're an experienced rookie!

    Wishin' I was fishin'...


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  17. Member Greg58's Avatar
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    #257
    Beeen boating for bettter part of 45 years so have done most everything on this thread at least once!
    One thing i have not read: Long before GPS buddy and I were to fish a Saturday morning club tournament. Decided to go down Friday after work, fish till midnight then sleep in the back of my truck (had a nice camper shell).It was a small ramp neither one of us had launched from before. About midnight we were cold tired and looking forward to eating the sandwiches we had brought and left in the truck. Headed back to the ramp but could not find it! Spent about three hours looking for it and when the gas gauge on the boat was about on E pretty much gave up! Found a dock and tied up, found the only extra clothing we had, rainsuits, put them on and tried to sleep a bit laying on the decks of the boat. It was cold and uncomfortable to say the least. Finally it started to get just a bit light out so we cranked up and sure enough found the ramp really quite close, amazing how hard it was to see in the dark. I bet we passed it 2o times that night. Pulled up to the bank and ran to the truck for warm clothes and food! As we were eating the rest of the club starts showing up. They were all wondering why we got there so early and why we were eating our lunch so soon. We just laughed it off and told them nothing. The real questions came after the tourney, As soon as we all took off for the day we headed straight to the marina to get gas!! The rest of the guys were wondering why we had to stop to buy expensive marina gas when we all fill up in town! Never did tell the story to the rest of the club! As far as they know we were just eager to fish that day!
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  18. Member Redneckgearhead's Avatar
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    #258
    Well I did it again. Picture it if you will, I work nights and usually never get Home in time for the morning bite. Well today was my lucky day. One of the younger techs wanted a few hours ot so I bailed at 3am. Got home, hooked the boat up, got everything ready, GoPro, cooler thermacell, rods are in the boat. I go get a jug of gas since my gauge lies. I get to the ramp, the water is as still as glass, I fight through the mosquitos get the boat in, it fires as soon as I touch the key. I get to my spot, the mist is coming off the lake, the sun is almost over the horizon, oh this is gonna be good fishing. I go to grab my tackle box out of its space under the p side console, and it's not there. My heart hits the lake bottom. I frantically search the boat, I don't have so much as a hook to throw in. Lol oh well maybe tomorrow.
    Last edited by Redneckgearhead; 06-28-2018 at 06:03 AM.
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  19. Member
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    #259
    My rookie mistake was backing the boat in water, plug wasn't in. 15 years ago

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    #260
    Oh my

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