Buckethead's 1974 Duracraft 1720

[Buckethead]

Well the beauty is that she doesn't want to go to either event either, it's just that her guilty concience will bug her until we go. This weekend's reunion is Sunday, next week's is Saturday. I may get an hour or two in on Saturday, luckily there is a river access 3 miles from my house, very convienient. Guess we'll see how it goes.

 

[Buckethead]

New 3 blade prop, me and the wife, raised the motor 1" off the transom, got 17 mph up river, 19 mph down river. Jumped on plane immediately without hesitation and the cavitation plate about 3" under water. Looks like I definitely need a jack plate. Still happy that its getting dialed in. Got caught in a huge thunderstorm while we were taking out, wife was standing in the water when lightning hit close by, said she could feel it in her legs. Short but productive trip.

Buckethead

 

[Buckethead]

Not much to update lately, been playing on the local rivers when we can. Been out a half dozen times or so, motor and boat perform as they should. I was talking to a coworker about possibly needing a jackplate and that I was planning on building one, he informed me of an old jackplate he had at his parents house, was going there this weekend and would bring back for me to try. Meanwhile I fabbed out a hydrofoil from a piece of 1/4" diamond plate I had. Last few times out I've been noticing the cavitation plate is still running 3" below the surface at WOT. The 3 blade prop gets it up on plane with no problem but runs too deep. I'll play with the hydrofoil until I get the jackplate then I'm sure more trial and error will continue. The 14" tires I had on the trailer had the boat sitting 29" off the ground, most boat ramps around me are very shallow which had the rear wheels of my suburban in the water, no good. I bought two new 12" tires and wheels from Orschelns, look good and I was able to put the original fenders back on the trailer. Smaller tires and wheels got me down quite a bit and really helped but I'm now considering taking out 3 of the seven leaf springs from the trailer, that should drop it another 1 1/2" and there should enough room between the tires and fenders. I might have to get fenders made for 12" tires instead of the originals that are for 8". Also new bearing buddies and dust covers installed. Anyway, here's a few pics from the last few weeks.

 

[Buckethead]

Well, went out for a boat ride / float trip today, me, the wife and 3 kids it did not get on plane, obviously due to 5 people, 4 adults and a 11 year old. I did leave the family on a gravel bar and WOW, what a difference, hydrofoil got the stern up but the boat is still running too deep. My co worker should have the jack plate for me tomorrow, hopefully I'll be able to get it installed and tested this next weekend. I'll post results.

Buckethead

 

[Buckethead]

Man, where did I leave off. Not only did I get the jack plate I've been doing quite a bit since I last posted in July. We had numerous river trips, my son was home on leave during August so naturally me and the boys had to go on a fishing trip. Didn't catch a lot due to the August heat but he was happy to be on the river, obviously ole dad was pretty tickled too. Anyway I've fogged the motor and put it away for the winter and have started working on the boat again.

As you'll see I decided to not rivet the hinge of the livewell lid, I'm going to use 5200 to attach the hinge. If you look at the lids to the battery access they rest on half of the livewell hinge. I want them to sit flush as possible so I used 5200 instead of rivets. I looked up specs on 5200 and it said it's 394 psi for an aluminum to aluminum ahesion. The stuff elongates 1350% so naturally a 1 lb. livewell lid is not going to put that kind of stress on it. If it fails at some point I'll rivet it. If anyone else has ever tried this way before I'd love to hear from you. Here's some pics.

Buckethead

 

[Buckethead]

Well I was able yesterday to get my bow seat base mounted finally, between work and weather I honestly wondered if I'd ever get it done. I was able to get to BPS in Springfield last weekend and get my stern seat base, the plan yesterday was to get both mounted but I could not find the stainless steel bolts I needed for the stern. I had what I needed for the bow but finding 6 more bolts was a little tough but Lowes in Fenton came through. I'm gonna try to get the stern done this next weekend. I also mounted the livewell lid to the hinge as well, a little additional grinding and it fits like socks on a rooster. Here's a couple pics.

Buckethead

 

[Buckethead]

Here's a few pics of my latest progress. I finally found a livewell for the stern at a place that scraps out old boats and sells the parts. I was able to reuse the original bench seat livewell lids on the stern, one for livewell access and the other for the fuel tank access. I've since put a coat of self etching primer on the pieces getting ready for my interior nonskid coating. I sure thought I'd be closer to finished with this project by now but it sure is fun. One of my buddies who has no patience for stuff like this keeps reminding me that I could have just bought a boat and would not have to mess with all of this, what I remind him of is that not only do I enjoy it I also know every inch of the boat and trailer and the layout will be as I want it.

Also if anyone knows where I could find edging for my aluminum pieces and some sort of rubber sealer to use to keep my rod locker and storage as dry as possible. I've seen it on tracker boats' livewell lids. It's like 1" wide and has adhesive on one side. Thanks

Buckethead

Well I'm only able to upload one picture, my new iphone takes pictures that are bigger than 2 MiB and they won't upload. I'm gonna have to come up with a different plan. I'll try to take smaller pics and get them posted.

 

[Buckethead]

I found my old iphone and took a couple pictures with it. There are some shadows in these pics since it's early in the morning but I think they can be seen ok.

Buckethead

 

[Gators5220]

Man that boat is coming together nicely, good work!

 

[Buckethead]

Thanks Gator, I'm very happy with it. Since my last post I was able to get my rod locker fabbed in as well as the switch panel and fuel guage. Here's a few more pics of my latest progress.

Buckethead.

 

[will15120]

The boat sure is looking good! Had that same engine but in a 9.8HP not a bad engine as long as you got a clean carb.

 

[Buckethead]

I had a mechanic friend tell me about fogging it with WD40 before putting it away for the winter and the carb will be ready for the next season. He was right, once I cleaned the plugs and rinsed the WD40 from the cylinders that thing fired up and runs as good this year as it did last. I've got fresh gas this year which we all know won't hurt a thing. No complaints about the Merc.

 

[Scout27]

Did you ever get the jackplate installed? That should make a big difference in planing and carrying weight. I assume it's a fixed unit, or can you adjust the height manually? Adjustments will give you a lot of options as well; different heights for different loads. Also, with the larger cavitation plate, you should be able to play with the trim angle as well; moving the pin up or down a hole or two for releasing the hull from sticking to the water, again, based on the load.

Everything looks great. Gonna be nice when you're all done. Keep up the good work.

 

[Gators5220]

That rod locker is a nice touch, I like it.

 

[Buckethead]

Negative on the jack plate, it's made for a larger horsepower motor so I haven't done anything with it yet. Since I have the batteries in the front now I'm gonna have to lower the motor to where it sits right on top of the transom. I played around with it and was able to raise it 3/4" and it ran fine. Now that there are 2 batteries in the bow the prop loses it's grip at WOT. With just me and the batteries I'm running 22 mph without the prop cavitating, as soon as I have a passenger it starts cavitating. My next trials will be as you suggested playing with trim angle and with or without plate. I'm actually going to try to fix that this week end as well as try to get my nonskid painted on. I'm picking up a gallon of battleship gray nonskid from the manufacturer in Cuba Mo on Thursday. The plan now is to finish prepping the inside and get 'er covered. That plan may change with the holiday weekend but I'm sure gonna try. I'll post pics of it before and after. You can see my choice of nonskid at www.bipacco.com

 

[Buckethead]

I didn't make it on the water but I did get 2 coats of nonskid painted on. The product went on very thick so I had to work a little harder to keep the coat thin. I thinned the mix with water for the second coat and it went on a lot better. I am very happy with the end result. It's a non toxic "green" product, not that "green" is at the top of my priority list but not having to worry about toxic vapors and fumes is a definite bonus. My surface was already sanded and primed so it was suggested by the owner of bipacco to wash down the surface to be covered with Dawn dish washing detergent to get rid of any oil. You'll see in my before and after pics I started outside then moved back into the garage, about halfway through the first coat, outside, one of the river birch trees and a gust of wind spread 10,000 seed pods about half the size of a pea all over my freshly painted surface. I was able to get them up with the shop vac and my pocket knife without too much trouble. Here's the pics. I don't think bipacco is a sponsor here but they should be, great product, easy to use and priced right. The product I used is called eco-tread in haze gray.

Buckethead

 

[bthompson92]

Awesome build! I just purchased a duracraft around the same year and size. Might have to steal some of your ideas!

 

[Buckethead]

Great to hear about another duracraft destined for the water again. Lots of good ideas on this forum. Good luck with your build and post plenty of pics.

 

[Carolina]

Great mod, Buckethead. I just got a similar Duracraft myself. I'm wondering the exact length of yours. Mine is about 14.5' long and 40" wide. Not sure if this classifies as a 1540 or what. I got a 25hp Mariner that I went through and refurbished. Runs great now. I get about 29mph according to GPS. I already removed the live well and welded up the holes. I don't have a real need for it. I want to remove the front bench seat and extend the bow seat out to make a deck just like yours. I was wondering if you noticed any side flex from the removal of that bench? I'd imagine the new front deck helps some. I'm going to fab the framing up from aluminum angle and rivet it in so it's structural. Then I'm going to add a layer of foam to the bottom and cover with aluminum like you did. Finally, the plan is to strip the whole thing down to bare metal with a wire wheel on my grinder, shoot it with Kem400, stencil it with bottomland camo, and cover the horizontal surfaces with hydroturf.

 

[Buckethead]

No, my boat has no side flex, you can't tell a difference with the bench removed. As for you model number I was told model numbers placed on boats years ago by Duracraft reflected the length and gunwale height. My boat is a 1720, it's actually 16' 6" long, 48" bottom, a 1648 or 1748 by today's standards. If your boat is older like mine it may be a 1520 or 1518, just a guess.