To take on another project or not! That's the Question!

[Josh256v]

12 years ago I bought a 1988 Stratos 256v for a song. It was rough, it had lived outside it's whole life, but I wanted a boat...bad...and at 20 years old this was all I could afford. I've put blood sweat and tears into the thing, tournament fished from it, and made a lot of memories. I've always wanted to upgrade, but financially, I've just never made buying a new boat a priority. Fast forward to today and I'm married with 2 boys and guess what? Still not quite in the spot to spend a lot to upgrade my rig. At the end of the day a 15.5' 40mph rig just isn't a family boat.

My good friend bought a 1989 Bass Tracker 1800FS (glass boat). It "looks" rough, but the 150 Merc runs great and the hull is solid. He offered it to me for $1500 which is about what he has is it. It needs a new switch panel, carpet, seats, trolling motor and a gelcoat restoration job (which I did with my Stratos). Transom and Floors seem solid. I used the lean on the motor and jump on the floor test.

Basically my thought is, if I take on this project, with a little elbow grease I can have my family out on the water in a boat with plenty of room and power to enjoy the day and also feel a little more comfotable fishing tournaments. Let's be honest, the little Stratos will wear you out running all over the lake on a tourney day.

Not really sure why I posted all this, just looking for opinions I reckon!

My current rig:


Potential Project:

[Tim W]

I say do it. Id double check to make sure u can still get a switch panel for that boat (unless of course you make your own).

It would be worth in in the end... I think.

[jimsch]

It will be a great upgrade, especially at that price.

[Lape0019]

If you’re willing to put the work in, I’d say it would be worthwhile. Looks pretty good in that pic!

[FishinSkinny]

Your careful with the money you do have. That's respectable. If you can find a good home for your stratos FIRST. Then I would personally be comfortable and excited about an upgrade. But keeping my options open. Maybe something else will come along shortly after that is family friendly and fishes well.

[Bassman Ia.]

Why make a project out of it? Re-carpet it, clean it up, make sure everything works and go enjoy it. $1500 for a glass boat with a 150 on it is a good buy. Be a perfect boat for those boys to learn how to operate.

[basscat tyler]

Go for it. Obviously you’re mechanically capable of doing anything that needs done. The price is right

[Josh256v]

Got the boat to my house to look it over. The floor has some pretty soft spots in it! My first gut instinct says run away. The engine runs, but the cowling is almost 2 different colors. You can definitely tell which side got the most sun...I'm struggling with a decision. $1500 sounds good and all, but it's in rougher shape than I thought.

[dstep0]

Doesn't even look like the same boat as the picture above. Quite the project and not sure I'd pay $1500 for that large of a project considering the money you'll need to put into it to get it lake ready. I'd say $750 may be more like it.

[Josh256v]

The pictures were taken a while back, unfortunately my friend left it in his back yard for a few months and didn't touch it. I was pretty disappointed when I went and got it to check it out.

Priorities:
Trolling motor
Switch Panel
Carpet
Seats
Restore Gel Coat
Soft Floor Replacement, which could mean stringer rot..

[joebone1]

you'll have $5k in it when done if you do all the work. questions is, is that boat worth $5k in good shape?

[Josh256v]

Trolling Motor-Maxxum 70- Already Have
Restore Gel- No cost, I already have the Pro-Tec kit
Switch Panel- $50.00 Amazon
Carpet- $300- I hate to do it myself but I have twice already

The soft floor is the scariest part.

[jturk4]

Not sure how those boats were put together, but i had an old Ranger 364V that i restored.
It had a soft front deck. The deck was plywood encased in glass and the wood core just rotted away. I was able to cut the top layer of glass out in one piece,(leaving the bottom piece of glass) removed all the rot and replaced with a new sheet of marine grade plywood and epoxied it in. Put the top layer of glass back in, epoxied, taped and re-glassed the seams, and it was as good as new.
It was all easy but took a lot of time...and the marine epoxy's and glass wasn't cheap. But using the westmarine system products was pretty easy.

[Bassman Ia.]

Trolling Motor-Maxxum 70- Already Have
Restore Gel- No cost, I already have the Pro-Tec kit
Switch Panel- $50.00 Amazon
Carpet- $300- I hate to do it myself but I have twice already

The soft floor is the scariest part.

I cut a section (2'x4') of the floor out on the passenger side of the Cockpit in a boat I once had. Fixed a stringer, glassed the stringer back in, replaced the floor, glassed it, rovan wovan, recarpeted all the cockpit area-----that was in 2001, the guy that bought it from me just resold it. He never had a problem with it. Time was the only problem, with work after cutting the area out---- took two months to complete. It was winter so it wasn't like it was leaving my garage anyway.

[Jeff Hahn]

Follow your gut...run Forrest, run!

[SkidooSteve12]

Can you keep your Stratos and keep fishing while working on the Tracker project boat? Granted using up your "free" time both fishing and working on the project boat is something to think about too.

I went and looked at a "cheap" project boat over the winter. It was shrink wrapped but had a little door to crawl inside at least. I saw pictures from the previous summer and it looked pretty nice in the pictures. Got there and it was a big let down... I'm sure similar to what you felt picking up the Tracker. I couldn't even test the motor and he wasn't ready to lower the price enough that I felt comfortable. I walked away from it and found a really nice boat that was basically the cost of what I figured I'd have put into the project boat. Sometimes... most of the time... it is best to follow your gut and accept that it is okay to walk away from "a good deal".

[Matt E.]

I'd walk away. Your list is backwards, the soft spots should be at the top of the list. The rest on the list is just cosmetics. There are better project boats out there for less, keep looking. I wouldn't take on an old boat with hull problems. You start cutting and potentially you don't stop until the boat is in multiple pieces. You just don't know.

[Josh256v]

So basically here's what I've decided to do. My buddy is in no hurry to sell it. I have sold my Stratos already but I did not commit to buying his rig. I expressed to him that I wasn't sure I wanted THAT big of a project. I'm going to keep it here in my warehouse at work. It needs a 2 hour vacuum job and a 2 hour pressure washing to see what's going on aesthetically. I don't mind putting a little elbow grease to try to polish a turd. When I start to dig in and inspect the floor is when I'll make a decision. If it isn't TOO bad I would feel better about making him some sort of offer. Ive stood on the motor pretty much and the transom doesn't flex at all. He fished out of it in November, but now the trolling motor seems locked up.

[croix-man]

The thing is you can buy a solid 18' glass boat from the late 90's for the same money you'll have in that 1989 by time you are done fixing it up.

[Josh256v]

I think I've come up with a solution for my time without a boat. I don't really want to buy this one to take risk on it. However, it does need a trolling motor. Since my buddy NEVER uses the thing, I'll buy a trolling motor and do as much work to it as I can in exchange for using the boat whenever I want. If he decides to sell it, he can reimburse for trolling motor...worst case scenario I'm about a couple hundred bucks and some labor time.