There isn't much that's finished in my life with everything seeming to be an ongoing project with upgrades or repairs being the norm for me. The house, the property, the truck, the Jeep, the M1078, the tractors, the trailers and so on ... all projects in various stages of incompletion.
18 months ago I bought a boat which was my first and probably my last. Last summer I had the first taste of what boat ownership would or could be and I was hooked. The boat was in excellent condition when I bought it, and compared to the cost of a new and equivalent boat it was a very good buy. The original owner called me around Christmas to ask me if I would sell it back to him when he discovered the cost of a new Robalo R200.
As nice as the boat was, over the winter it occurred to me that the boat could be better, and it could be a project that I could complete. How nice would it be to have something that is complete, finished, done, such that all I have to do is maintain, wash, wax and enjoy the boat for the next 20 years. Perhaps getting this project done will be the first domino that falls.
Back in January I created a spreadsheet and listed a lot of nice upgrades and began ordering parts. A few weeks ago after getting my boat out of storage I took a week off work with the plan to get as much done as possible but it rained most of the week so no boat upgrades were completed.
Last weekend I was finally able to start on the upgrades and get a feel for the challenges that are part and parcel of working on a boat such as tight spaces, limited access, fiberglass, gelcoat, etc. I was going to title this thread "The ebb and flow of boat ownership" since that's how it's been with the upgrades. Some have been easier than I thought and others much harder. I'm nowhere near done but progress has been made. An old (cheap) transducer has been removed and three new transducers installed. A new jack plate with two transom backing plates has been installed. Bolting the new 200hp outboard to the jack plate is an easy job. The rigging will take an hour or so but again not hard.
Last night I was thrilled to discover that Robalo installed a large rigging tube between the center console and the rear bilge which will make pulling wires easy. Some have a very hard time getting wires from the back to the front, and since I have lots of wires to pull including for the three transducers, jack plate, trim tabs and second battery, this rigging tube is a game changer. I used the old transducer cable to pull two pieces of nylon line through the tube. I'll use the old transducer cable and one of the lines to pull the wires but will leave one line in the tube in case I need to pull something else through.
I still have to install the trim tabs which has been a bit of a fiasco. I originally ordered 24"x9" trim tabs then returned those for 18"x9" only to discover that they wouldn't fit on the transom due to Robalo's decision to limit the size of the mounting area. I returned the 18"x9" tabs and got 12"x12" instead, but even then, I have to remove some material from the stainless steel mounting plates and hinges to fit in the area that Robalo designated for tabs.
I'll provide some updates over the summer as I complete the other upgrades such as a whole new JL Audio sound system, a new GPSMAP display, Radar, VHF antenna, compass and more, and my very ambitious attempt to make a large, contiguous flat area on the console to allow me to install two displays.
Here's the old AIRMAR transducer with the marge larger and more capable Garmin transducer.
Measure ten times and drill once!
Here are the three new transducers installed in the hull along with the view from underneath the boat. Transducer placement is important, and since the boat has an 18 degree deadrise I had to install one on each side of the keel. The long transducers are ClearView/SideView models.
Here's the jack plate installed and the bit of "machining" I had to do to clear one of the through-hull fittings. I cut and drilled a section of 3" c-channel to install on the inside of the transom to support the load. The upper bolts have a cast aluminum ROBALO branded plate that serves as a backer plate to support the load.
