flat bottom question for you catfishermen!

[monsterkat11]

so i'm thinking about purchasing a landau 16 foot boat this week, with a 9.9 motor on it. the only problem is the boat seems a bit narrow to me, i can't imagine it being less than 48 inches at the beam, actually i did some research and i think the smallest 16 foot boat they made was 56 inches at the beam. exact distance aside, my question is:

if the boat is 48 inches or under at the beam (top of the boat) should i have problems if i need to be pulling a 40+ pound flathead over the side?

thanks in advance for the replies!

 

[Bubba]

Have you looked at the boat, and measured it? 48 inches at the BEAM doesn't seem wide enough for a 16' boat. I would imagine a normal 16' boat would be at least 48 inches wide at the bottom(which is the typical measuring point of a boats width)....ie. 1648 would be 48 inches wide across the bottom...not the beam. I would just measure it, and maybe ask them to do a test run on the water to see what you thought.

 

[Quackrstackr]

Like Bubba said, the beam doesn't matter nearly as much as the bottom.

There are some skinny boats out there. Depending on the depth of the sides, you could start taking on water in one of them pulling a 40lber over the side.