'83 Bass Tracker Revival

[Troutman3000]

You guys never cease to amaze me with the ingenuity I find in these posts.

 

[BYOB Fishing]

It's been a while, but after a few weeks of working on it here and there, 10 or 20 minutes at a time, I've managed to get the carpet and flooring ripped out, and most of the soaked rotten foam out.

Now, I've cut, sealed, and painted the transom. I'm test fitting it along with the cap to make sure it's fitting. Seems to be working out, now I have to find some stainless hardware to re-attach it to the boat. My goal before the weather gets too cold is to install the bilge pump, gas tank, battery boxes and battery charger. More or less, get everything that goes in the rear compartment together so that I can focus on the rest of the boat. Once all of that is either in or dry-fit, I'm going to have it welded back together. I'm going to then put in the floor, so that I have a base for the rod locker I'm going to install on the left side. I'm also going to put some tackle storage in the middle and on the right side, just in front of the console.

One thing I noticed while spraying it out with the hose is that water has a terrible time escaping. This boat was not engineered to drain. Water has to be at least an inch deep to get over the boxed-in channel around the drain plug. Only then will it get to the plug, which isn't level with the floor.

 

[DaveInGA]

BYOB,

Looks like you're making some good progress. I am restoring a 1986 Tracker V-17 and I see a lot of similarities in construction to yours. Mine doesn't drain well either and I think the original decks were designed to feed water back to a drain hole to the left of the console on mine. I plan to drill some bigger weep holes. Mine drains, but so slowly as to be almost useless.

One thing I didn't have problems with is the foam. It appears the flotation foam was improved by the mid-eighties and the foam in mine doesn't appear to hold/absorb water.

A couple of pieces of information that may be useful to you:

1. Your console cap is made of fiberglass. If it has problems and you can fiberglass, it won't be hard to fix. I don't have fiberglass skills, but I was able to fairly easily find a Tracker dealership that still had a "new old stock" replacement cap for $100.00. This was cheaper than I could hire anybody to repair my old console cap.

You may want to call around to the Marine outfits in your area. I found mine at Athens Marine. They haven't carried Tracker boats in years, but still had the cap in their store room. If you can't find one and want to buy a new one, pm me and I can give you their contact information. I'm sure they'll be glad to ship one and last I knew they still have one in their stock room.

2. A 50/50 mixture of Acetone and Xylol will dissolve all that nasty old carpet glue. Or you can buy GOOF OFF pre mixed. Big labor and time saver. Here's a brief rundown:

Spray it on generously and let the chemicals work for a minute or two to break down the glue. Once the crud is dissolved/softened, you can scrape most of it off, then use a piece of fairly coarse steel wool (best) or a green scrubbie pad (okay) to break it down, then rinse it off with a water hose. Check my build in my sig for greater detail and pics.

3. I haven't done it yet, but if your steering cable exterior is badly faded and dinged up like mine, you can order heat shrink in sizes big enough to recover the exterior. I'm going to "paint" the dings/cracks/etc. with liquid electric tape, let that dry, then slide the heat shrink over that.

4. BP blaster penetrating oil is your friend. That stuff is a live saver when removing stuck rusty bolts/nuts on the trailer. Allowed me to save all the stainless steel hardware on my trailer even though the self locking nuts were pretty much rusty crud.

Hope this helps.

 

[BYOB Fishing]

BYOB,

Looks like you're making some good progress. I am restoring a 1986 Tracker V-17 and I see a lot of similarities in construction to yours. Mine doesn't drain well either and I think the original decks were designed to feed water back to a drain hole to the left of the console on mine. I plan to drill some bigger weep holes. Mine drains, but so slowly as to be almost useless.

One thing I didn't have problems with is the foam. It appears the flotation foam was improved by the mid-eighties and the foam in mine doesn't appear to hold/absorb water.

A couple of pieces of information that may be useful to you:

1. Your console cap is made of fiberglass. If it has problems and you can fiberglass, it won't be hard to fix. I don't have fiberglass skills, but I was able to fairly easily find a Tracker dealership that still had a "new old stock" replacement cap for $100.00. This was cheaper than I could hire anybody to repair my old console cap.

You may want to call around to the Marine outfits in your area. I found mine at Athens Marine. They haven't carried Tracker boats in years, but still had the cap in their store room. If you can't find one and want to buy a new one, pm me and I can give you their contact information. I'm sure they'll be glad to ship one and last I knew they still have one in their stock room.

Actually, It's all aluminum. I wasn't planning on keeping it, either. I really don't like the angle of the steering wheel, the placement of the gages, the flat windshield, the switches.....everything mostly. hahaha I've found one that originally went on a G3 on eBay classifieds that I'm going to go after. It's $250, but it comes with all the gages, updated switches, and a steering wheel.

2. A 50/50 mixture of Acetone and Xylol will dissolve all that nasty old carpet glue. Or you can buy GOOF OFF pre mixed. Big labor and time saver. Here's a brief rundown:

Spray it on generously and let the chemicals work for a minute or two to break down the glue. Once the crud is dissolved/softened, you can scrape most of it off, then use a piece of fairly coarse steel wool (best) or a green scrubbie pad (okay) to break it down, then rinse it off with a water hose. Check my build in my sig for greater detail and pics.

I will try this out for sure.

3. I haven't done it yet, but if your steering cable exterior is badly faded and dinged up like mine, you can order heat shrink in sizes big enough to recover the exterior. I'm going to "paint" the dings/cracks/etc. with liquid electric tape, let that dry, then slide the heat shrink over that.

The cable is out in the shed right now...I don't remember how bad it was, but I didn't really notice any big problems with it when it was on the boat. I'll keep this in mind, though.

4. BP blaster penetrating oil is your friend. That stuff is a live saver when removing stuck rusty bolts/nuts on the trailer. Allowed me to save all the stainless steel hardware on my trailer even though the self locking nuts were pretty much rusty crud.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for all of the advise! I spent about an hour the other night reading through all the pages of your mod. It's looking good...I'm also going to try the stripper on the decals. We tried the goo gone, and that didn't work at all. They are really on there good.

Thanks again!!

Matt

 

[TNtroller]

looks like you have a lot of work done from when you brought it home, and making progress is good. Keep up the hard work, and good luck.

 

[BYOB Fishing]

looks like you have a lot of work done from when you brought it home, and making progress is good. Keep up the hard work, and good luck.

Yeah, it's allot of work, and I don't have allot of time to work on it either. It sounds like I'm finally going to be able to order the gas tank, which should allow me to get started on buttoning up the rear end. The new permanent tank is too big to fit through the hatch opening unless the rear cap is off.

 

[BYOB Fishing]

I was able to get the boat off the trailer and turned upside down to wash. I used the muriatic acid and a scotch bright pad and got all of the brown deposits off. I had originally planned to polish up the bottom. When I started with the polish, I found the pitting on the bottom to be too bad, and the bottom just wouldn't come clean; the polish worked into the pits and left black spots all over. Now, I think I'm just going to paint the whole thing black. Not really what I wanted to do, but I don't know any other way.





I was able to get the decals off with stripper. I went to NAPA and bought the aircraft stripper, but ran out after only doing the reg. numbers and about 5' of the stripe. I was in Wal-Mart and found a can of Kwik Strip that was $4 cheaper, and in a bigger can. I bought that, and found that it worked better than the other stuff, was cheaper, took off the adhesive, and I even have some left over.

Matt

 

[BYOB Fishing]

I've been working with the wire wheel and have removed alot of the grime the acid didn't take off. I spent about two hours with it. I made an attempt to polish up part of the side by hand, but it just isn't looking too good, the wire wheel helped take out some of the pitting, but it was still fairly easy to see once the polish was applied. I think I'm going to just leave the exposed aluminum with the "brushed" look, maybe by going over it with some sandpaper to make the texture more uniform, removing the swirl marks from the wire wheel.

 

[ElPresidente]

I had the same problem with the polish getting into the pits when I tried to polish my 77 tracker. I had to wet sand the whole thing with 600 wet sandpaper. Then I polished it with mother aluminum polish and a mothers polish ball. It was an exhausting process. it took me 4 weekends to finish.

I took a hairdryer to my decals and they pealed right off.

I'm going to tackle the job of replacing my transom in the next month. How difficult was replacing yours? Any tips? It looks like we have the same transoms

 

[BYOB Fishing]

Replacing the transom really wasn't that hard. Just had to cut the welds which was a little intimidating but I figured the boat was worthless the way it was, so giving the transom replacement a try couldn't hurt the value any. Don't worry about trying to save the splash well drain if you do decide to replace it. Bass pro has nylon replacement drains for $5...I tore my drain up getting the wood out and I was worried about replacing it.

Btw, welcome!!!!

Matt

 

[ElPresidente]

Thanks for responding. I'm nervous about cutting the welds too, but as you said it is worthless unless I fix it. When I tear into it I'm going to try and take detailed photos and notes and post so the next person dealing with these old great boats will have a little help along the way. Thanks for the welcome too

 

[BYOB Fishing]

I have done a preliminary review of costs. Here is what I've spent so far:

$400-Boat
$52-Hull Registration (Required within 15 days of purchase, good till 2013)
$32-Transom Wood
$5-Wood Glue
$12-Muriatic Acid
$6-Xylene
$6-Acetone
$9-Spray Bottles
$6-Scrubbing Sponge
$11-Decal Stripper
$14-Aluminum Polish
$7-Rivets
$18-Rivet Gun
$21-Bilge Pump
$31-Livewell Pump
$5-Splashwell Drain
$7-Bilge Pump Install Kit
$4-Livewell Screen
$26-Battery Boxes
$37-Winch
$138-1 Gallon Steelflex (Delivered)
$2170-2009 Mercury 60hp Four Stroke with Tilt/Trim
$14-Electrical Supplies (Heat shrink, nylon tubes)
$4-Steel Wool
$6-Paint Supplies (Foam rollers and cheap brushes)
$180-Gas Tank
$8-Non-Skid Tape
$70-Fuel Line, vent hose, elbos, connectors and clamps
$16-Fuel tank hold down kit
$19-Thru-hull fuel fill
$44-Bilge/livewell paint and primer
$20-Rib repair hardware
$5-Rib repair aluminum stock
$20-livewell drain hose
$2-Livewell drain tube
$62-More transom supplies, I drilled the first transom wrong...
$44-Transom hardware
$9-Thru-hull battery charger plug
$6-Adjustable livewell spray head
$6- Spar Varnish
$65- Transom and bow eye rewelding
$125-trailer and boat paint/primer/clearcoat
$45-LED trailer light kit
$7-Trailer chains
$50-New set of trailer hubs
$100-Seats
$175-Console
$150-Throttle/shifter handle
$1090-Power Pole
$2547-Electronics
$45-Fuse panel
$90-Carpet
$12-Weldwood Glue
$100-Trolling Motor Wiring Kit
$27-14ga. Marine Wiring
$25-Trailer Jack
$7-Anchor Light
$25-Anchor/Nav light bases
$120-Trailer Registration

Total Spent- $8,357 so far (10/22/2012)

I've also put together a list of my "Wants". That includes LED lighting, premium seats, a brand new 50hp Mercury outboard, and 7" Lowrance HDS electronics. The goal is to have a really nice version of the Pro Team 175, without a multi-year $300/Mo. loan. I plan to pay cash as I go for the items as they are needed, up until it's time for the motor and electronics...I'll have to review the financial situation and what's available at that time.

Here is a list of what I have left to purchase. As I purchase items, I will update the above list/total with the cost. On the below list, I will strike out the items and write the cost I actually paid next to it. I will update the total below the list with the amount left to spend. These are in no particular order, just how I thought of them as I'm making the list.

[strike]$60-Steelflex bottom epoxy[/strike] (Paid $138)
[strike]$162-Permanent 12 gallon gas tank[/strike] (Paid $180)
[strike]$50-Aluminum gas tank support structure[/strike] Won't Need This
[strike]$15-Fuel Fill/vent hose[/strike] Paid $70 for lines, elbos, connectors and clamps
[strike]$26-Fuel Fill/Vent through-hull fitting[/strike] Paid $19
[strike]$20-Bilge/Livewell Primer[/strike]
[strike]$24-Bilge/Livewell Paint[/strike]
[strike]$100-Transom/Bow Eye Re-welding[/strike] (Paid $65)
$30-Cooler Box Drainage System
[strike]$10-Steel Wool[/strike] (Paid $4)
[strike]$30-Hull Primer[/strike]
[strike]$40-Hull Paint[/strike]
[strike]$4-Painters Tape/Supplies (Spent $6 so far, set aside $10)[/strike]
$100-Plywood/Lumber
[strike]$60-Fasteners[/strike] Spent $62 so far
$14-Wood Sealer/Paint Spent $6 so far
[strike]$16-Foam Sheets[/strike] Paid $19
[strike]$80-4ga. Wire
$80-14ga. Wire[/strike]
[strike]$16-Electrical Supplies (spent $14 so far, allowed $30 total)[/strike]
[strike]$175-Molded console w/ gages, fuse box, switches, and steering wheel[/strike]
[strike]$80-Carpet[/strike]
[strike]$30-Carpet Glue[/strike]
$40-Hatch Hinges and Handles
$90-LED Lighting Kit
[strike]$15-Trolling Motor Paint/Primer[/strike]
$30-Trolling Motor Decal Set
[strike]$20-Trolling Motor Receptacle[/strike]
[strike]$20-Trolling Motor Plug[/strike]
[strike]$54-50amp Circuit Breaker[/strike]
[strike]$120-Battery Charger[/strike] Paid $116
$10-Trim Switch for Front
$15-Front Face Plate
[strike]$17-Non-Skid Tape[/strike] (Paid $8 at Wal-Mart)
$60-Nav Lights
[strike]$40-Nav Light Bases[/strike]
[strike]$110-Seats[/strike]
[strike]$70-Seat Posts[/strike]
$7-Floor Drain
$10-Seat Hardware
$10-Tackle Organizer
$25-Rod Organizer
$22-Deck Rod Buckles
[strike]$10-Adjustable Livewell Spray head[/strike] $6 on sale
[strike]$10-Drain Plugs[/strike]
[strike]$60-Trailer Rollers[/strike]
[strike]$10-Trailer Bow Stop[/strike]
[strike]$15-Trailer Primer[/strike]
[strike]$20-Trailer Paint[/strike]
[strike]$45-Trailer Jack[/strike]
[strike]$16-A/C Battery Charger Plug[/strike]
$65-Transom Tie Downs
[strike]$14-Transom Eyes[/strike] Decided to use the old ones
[strike]$15-Safety Chain[/strike]
[strike]$75-Trailer Modifications[/strike] Not going to do any modifications right now
[strike]$60-LED Trailer Lights[/strike]
$75-Batteries Bought one, $75 so far..
$30-Stock Aluminum Spent $5 so far, set aside $35
[strike]$75-New Guide-ons[/strike] Going to use the old guide ons
$40-Transom Saver
$72-Pinstripes/Decals Spent $27 so far
[strike]$120-Trailer Registration[/strike]
$160-Trailer Rims
$10-Lug Nuts
$16-Center Caps
$120-Tires

$1,006 Left to spend on boat items (10/22/2012)


[strike]$4,400-50HP Mercury 2-Stroke[/strike] (Paid $2170 for 60hp Merc 4-stroke)
[strike]$500-Tilt/Trim Unit[/strike] (Tilt/Trim on motor already)
[strike]$200-Controls[/strike] Paid $150
[strike]$200-Installation[/strike] Installed myself!!
$1000-Motor Repairs

$1000 Left to spend on motor items.


[strike]$2,547-Lowrance HDS7 Complete Bow/Console System with Basemap and Structure Scan[/strike]

Total original budget for everything was $12,497. The 2/19/2012 adjustment is $10,363 which includes $1,000 for any motor repairs needed. The out-the-door price of a Pro Team 175 w/ a 60hp Four Stroke is $15,419. Once I installed a few of the extras, like the tackle/rod organizers, LED light kits, A/C battery charger plug, and updated the electronics, and power pole the price is closer to $19,170. So, that puts the savings around $8,807. Plus, as I mentioned, no large monthly payment on a multi-year loan.

Let me know what you think, and if I've left anything out!!

Matt

 

[KRS62]

I have a 2003 Mercury 50 (2 stroke) on my boat, so I set up an EBay search set up for "Mercury 50." There are quite a few motors that pop up every few weeks that are floor models and/or other good looking motors people are selling. I bet you could land a nice motor for around $2K.

KRS

 

[BYOB Fishing]

Yeah I spent some time looking through that as well. I just dont want to be purchasing someone elses trouble. It would have to be the right deal at the right time.

 

[TNtroller]

don't know if its true or not, but have heard of people finding brand new motors but a couple of years old at dealers. They just didn't sell for whatever reason, the unit got pushed to the back corner and forgotten. Worth a phone or two. GL with it all, know you will enjoy it when its done and on the water.

 

[poolie]

Nice build Matt. Looks like most of the grungy work is behind you. Look forward to seeing the rest.

 

[BYOB Fishing]

There is a local guy that just opened a boat shop in town with a 75hp Johnson. He said he had been using it to steal parts from, but was going to work on it over the winter to get it back up and going, total rebuild. I'm not sure of the year, but it looks to be late 70's. He wanted $2k for it. I was hoping for something oil injected, so I didn't have to mix gas and oil. Not sure if that's something I wanted to go for....But I like the idea of 75hp. He estimated the boat might hit 50mph with that on it.

I am so sick of wire wheeling...Funny thing is, that wire wheel has now been through two boat rebuilds and is still intact. I don't know why, but for my two previous boat builds (prior to this tracker rebuild), I painted a bare Alumacraft, and for the second one wire wheeled a painted Lund. I always seem to do everything backwards. :LOL2:

 

[BYOB Fishing]

Ordered the Steelflex for the bottom yesterday. They recommended getting a gallon, but couldn't give me a price over the phone. They emailed the invoice today...$138 delivered, and it shipped yesterday. I don't know if I would have gone that route if I knew it was so much. I ordered the super-slick 9X-2000, that's probably why...But I wanted it to be a nice, smooth pad for the boat to ride on. Hopefully it works!

Updated the COSTS post above...Overbudget already! hahaha

 

[BYOB Fishing]

Steelflex arrived today. It was pretty beat up, but nothing was leaking out so I guess it's OK. Looking forward to a long three-day weekend this weekend to put it on, If I can get the garage up to 75 degrees by then.

 

[cali27]

Steelflex arrived today. It was pretty beat up, but nothing was leaking out so I guess it's OK. Looking forward to a long three-day weekend this weekend to put it on, If I can get the garage up to 75 degrees by then.

Make sure to get that garage up to temp, I made that mistake when applying my steelflex. The boat looks great so far by the way.