Adding a bow eye?

After making sure that the rear of the boat is taken care of now, and stalled out on the trailer (I wanted to go fishing!) for the moment, I took a good look at the front of the boat.

My boat doesn't have any kind of bow eye. The previous owners all did the same thing, which is to secure the front of the boat to the trailer via the handle on the bow. I'm not real keen on this, as it's way above the winch point so I'm essentially pulling down and into the trailer, and the handle has been there since the boat was new (1955), and I'm waiting for the day that it finally quits.

With that in mind, is there an easy way to add a bow eye to the front of the boat?

If it's not too involved I'll try to get to it while we've still got open water, otherwise it'll be a winter project.

Thanks!

C

Seems pretty easy...mine is just bolted through the hull with two bolts...

Are we talking about a boat with a flat nose or a V nose?

I have a 1436 flat bottom. There was a piece of aluminum welded to the front so I took another piece of aluminum and bolted it on the inside with stainless bolts and 3M 5200. Now I had a really strong nose. I then drilled two holes and bolted in a stainless bow eye that I picked up on iboats. I was worried about pulling the bow eye through the front of the boat is why I added the aluminum. I can take pics for you tomorrow if my explanation dosnt make since. I havnt started my decks yet so its all still open and will be easy to get good pics of what I did.

Mine's a V-hull, I had suspected it'd be as easy as just drilling a hole through the front keel and making sure I had something along the back to distribute the force of adding the ring. I just don't want to mess up a perfectly good floating boat. :lol: It's made it 56 years this way already, I don't want to tempt fate!

C

I have the same problem. And my handle at the top of the bow has cracked from the downward force of the winch cable. I am going to try your solution. I think if I put the eye as far above the water line as I can it should be ok.

It's very easy. I put one on my boat this summer in about 10 minutes. Just lay out and drill two holes and then fasten the eye.

I bought three of these.
https://www.iboats.com/Bow-Stern-Eye-Stainless-Steel/dm/cart_id.625949698--session_id.472720550--view_id.56035