Why buy new? What's your reasoning? Is this your first boat? You can save yourself 20 to 30% by buying a slightly used boat that is a year to four or five years old. You can still buy extended warranties for a slightly used boat. Boats don't build equity like real estate. I bought my first two boats new because I didn't know much about boating. If I would have known then what I known now, I surely would have bought a slightly used boat. By saying used, I don't mean 10 or 20 years old but you can find a great deal on a boat that is a year or two old.

Look here to start...

www.Yachtworld.com www.UsedBoats.com www.Boattrader.com www.boatus.com

Those are good places to start. You can put your price range in and even your year range and get some good ideas of what's out there within your price range.

My buddy just bought a 1994 Sea Ray Signature 220 Overnighter that was Boatel kept all it's life with 129 hours on it. We went and sea trialed it in Saturday. It looked brand spanking new. I couldn't believe my eyes. I was like... there is no way this boat is in this good of shape. But the owners were meticulous and kept it spotless, kept up on the maintenance, etc.

He got the boat for $12,800 and bought a brand new trailer (4700 lb roller trailer with disc brakes) and got the whole package out the door for $17,000 even.

It pays to look around and just don't think new is better.

My boat was tied up to slip B3 which is right along the bulkhead... which was permanatly fixed to land. Fortunately, my boat and my section of dock doesn't stick far enough out into the river to be affected by the trecherous current. Look at the water coming around the bridge support... that would be hell for any boat sticking out in its path.

I was at the boat today and the only adjustment I had to make was to loosen a spring line a tad... Otehr than I'm good to go.

I can't leave my dock because all of the boats at the end of the fairway are crunched together and the entrance to the fairway from the river is now blocked with broken docks, boats strung everywhere and debris. Looks like I'll be getting drunk at the dock for a few weeks! haha.

If you need a bow thruster in a 28 ft boat... you should stick to a canoe. It's probably safer for all of us other boaters on the water around you.

There is no need for a bow thruster on a boat that size, even if it is a single screw. With a little practice in all the wrong conditions, you'll be able to steer the boat any which way you want. Learn to work the boat in conjunction with conditions... always try to put the bow into the wind, use opposite propulsion to steer the boat and learn how the boat handles in all conditions.

On the Potomac River on any given weekend you will find boaters with cruisers up to 30 ft with Honda EU2000i generators strapped to their swim platforms or pulpit areas which runs their 120v electronics on the boat. Most all of them have a red 5 gal can of gasoline on board to refuel their genny once it runs out of fuel after 8 to 10 hours. I've never been fond of rafting up with someone who had a Honda genny and 5 gallons of gas in a litle red plastic can on the boat... But fortunately there has not been an accident. I would say a good 200 -300 people are using this configuration too.

Thank god I have my Kohler 5kw in my boat!

Heavy rains and rising waters on the tidal Potomac and Occoquan rivers caused massive damage to area marinas this weekend. High water, strong currents and flood like conditions caused docks to give way, pylons to break free and caused docks to float down river only to collide with boats and other piers along the river.

Mid afternoon, Cliff Small a local Occoquan resident and boater; dialed 911 to inform the Coast Guard and local authorities that the pier from the new Gas Light Landing town home community on the Occoquan River had broke free and was floating down river towards Prince William Marina and several other marinas. During this time, local marinas were notified and local fire and rescue boats were dispatched to help fend off floating debris.

The aluminum docks slammed into A dock at Occoquan Harbour Marina. While the dock stayed stationary for the majority of the day, at approximately 2 am on Tuesday morning, A dock gave way and the end of it splintered off and crashed into B dock. Electricity has been shut down on A dock until the recovery operation has been completed according to OHM's dock master.

The high waters and high tides caused flooding along the water front in Old Town Occoquan. Local businesses were placing sand bags around all doors and entry points of their structures at around 9 pm on Monday night. Local authorities were also pumping out storm drains in hopes to relieve some of the burden that the flooding waters were causing to sewer and storm drain systems.

[img]http://www.weekendpirate.com/images/stories/easygallery/resized/28/1210686575_0513080815a.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.weekendpirate.com/images/stories/easygallery/resized/28/1210686369_0513080819.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.weekendpirate.com/images/stories/easygallery/resized/28/1210686334_0513080820.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.weekendpirate.com/images/stories/easygallery/resized/28/12106892452008-05-12182359_200805120011.jpg[/img]

Sean John Fishing Apparel; Adding cultural diversity to a redneck sport.

Don't let mama dolphin know we're actually huffin the C02 back here!

Thanks guys! I knew you'd like that one! hehe.

If I was fueling my boat with Stacey on the boat in front of my... I'd probably run into her boat too... just so we can exchange information haha... j/k

My wife would probably do all the exchanging and I'd be at work trying to figure out how to repay the Hanrahan's for the $10,000 worth of gelcoat work I needed to pay for!

Garmin - Bird sh*t proof products for your boat.

This is a great YouTube video!!!!!! hahaha.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tHMvdBP2RQ

damn Stacey is hot. Even my wife thinks so! Now that's a compliment!

I've heard of "flying under the radar" before but this much easier!

Then you could save your last $10 for a bus ride to the free clinic! haha.

That's a lot of dirty holes!

Invest it to make it $2,000,000 dollars.

Who the heck still has their boats shrink wrapped? We've been boating since the end of March! Geez!

I've already welcome'd myself! :-)

:-O

Sorry Stacey! Tell your hubby if he needs a roomate after you divorce him, we can shack up together out there in Havasu! haha.

LOL

I'm speechless.

If Stacey had some bikini photos up of her, we wouldn't have to venture out in the wild, now would we???

:-) C'mon Stacey!

Nah... just found a REALLY good bikini site today so I wanted to share with the class. Sorry!

I guess I can share this one then...

http://www.theGirlsofHavasu.com

:-)

Red Snapper!

I can't tell if it's Lake Havasu or Fake Havasu... either way, I'm content!

Hail to the POTP'ers! LOL

Always doing my best to brighten my fellow boaters' day!

I'll just give you a few reasons below...

[img]http://www.thegirlsofhavasu.com/Girls%20Of%20Havasu/2008/Havasu%2020080322/IMG_7024.JPG[/img]

[img]http://www.thegirlsofhavasu.com/Girls%20Of%20Havasu/2008/Havasu%20200804%20April/IMG7080.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.thegirlsofhavasu.com/Girls%20Of%20Havasu/2007/2007%2004%20April/IMG_7383.JPG[/img]

[img]http://www.thegirlsofhavasu.com/Girls%20Of%20Havasu/Web1/IMG_5152.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.thegirlsofhavasu.com/Girls%20Of%20Havasu/Web1/IMG_4615.JPG[/img]

Here's to you, Mr. helmet wearing, boat grounding, Bud Light drinker... A real American Hero!

Well we went out last night and had prop troubles so I didn't get a chance to take pics of the finished project. I'll try to get to it soon and post them up.

Great thanks!

Would that be this one?

[img]http://www.circlipindia.com/images/internal-cup-star-washer.jpg[/img]

or this kind?

[img]http://www.midwestmil.com/lockwashers.jpg[/img]

Yes this one has the allen head bolt that threads into the center. I am not sure if it has a lock washer on it or not. Any idea what size washer it would be? I might go grab two stainless steel ones today at West Marine or Boater's World.

2002

Last night we took the boat for a cruise and we noticed a weird vibration coming from around the outdrive area of the boat at idle speeds. The vibration sounded like the props were way out of balance or something was getting caught up in between the counter rotating props of our twin Bravo III's. Just before we hit the end of the no wake zone, I decided to turn around pull up to the last dock in the channel. We lifted the engine hatch and looked around thinking maybe a motor mount had came loose and one of the motors were vibrating. Not the case. After we determined it wasn't coming from the engine bay, we trimmed the drives all the way up and starting feeling around the props.

We immediately noticed that both prop anodes (cones) were extremely loose so much that we could wiggle them in all directions and rotate them back and forth! I felt the allen bolt in the center and I noticed I could tighten it with my fingers and loosen it up again. We tightened them down with the correct size allen wrench but I am wondering now what caused them to break loose. BOTH drives had the same problem. I just replaced the anodes prior to launching the boat this spring but had the marina install them.

Has anyone ever seen the allen bolts come loose on these things? Once we tightened them up, the boat ran fine with no vibration. I'm just wondering if something else might have caused them to come loose, like a loose prop nut, bad thrust bearing or something else. There was no play in the props themselves so I don't think we have a prop issue... I'm just concerned about them coming loose again while underway.

Can you put thread lock on them to keep them tight?

Any ideas?

[img]http://destinsharks.com/gallery2/d/180-4/propanode.jpg[/img]

I got my 6 pack OUPV (Inland) from www.MERGLLC.COM. They will travel to you and proctor the test and class time if you can get a full class scheduled and paid for in advance through them. Contact Jim McAllister for more info at jim@mergllc.com

I also built their website for them too... so be sure to tell them what a nice job I did :-)

Fighting on the Internet is like winning in the Special Olympics... even if you win, you're still retarded.

I'll try to get some pics up tonight or tomorrow first thing.

I recently bought a very used 2002 Sea Ray 280 Sundancer that the previous owner seemed to use quite a bit. It had 300 hours on it when I picked it up in March. The vinyl needed plenty of TLC to get it back to white and after sitting in the Inner Harbor (industrial area) in Baltimore, MD over the winter uncovered it was quite a chore to bring this boat back to life.

This past weekend I took my carpet steam cleaner to the boat in hopes of getting the soiled carpet clean in the cabin. There was rust around some of the snaps for the carpet runners, water stains from where the ice in the fridge had melted then leaked out onto the floor (and no one bothered to clean up) and all sorts of grime all over the carpet. With all the steam cleaning in the world, the boat wouldn't come clean.

I decided I just can't deal with the look of the carpet anymore so my buddy and I put in some Brazilian cherry engineered hardwood flooring that was almost an exact match to the cabinets and interior that Sea Ray put in the boat.

We're finishing it up tonight and I'll be posting some pics of our progress from start to finish. Overall it was a really easy project and so far the boat looks a million times better than it did with the ol' dirty carpet.

Then I'd say you ate too much Mexican food for lunch. haha

Frank you said Land Mine... so I said, GO ARMY! nevermind... it's almost happy hour in DC... :-)

Back to topic...

I always put the bow into the wind since my fuel door is on the stern of the boat. I'd rather have the wind carry the fumes away than load up my cockpit or cabin.

I always close all hatches and doors.

I run the blower prior to starting the boat for approx 4min, usually run it all the way to the gas dock (since my boat is on the gas dock at our marina) then leave it running until I'm underway in the channel at crusing speed.

I always ground myself prior to inserting the nozzle by touching something on the boat and I don't drag my feet across the dock when I have a fuel hose in my hand.

I make sure all my passengers are off the boat and clear just in case. I'd rather be the one that sinks to the bottom rather than my wife and my 8 year old son and dog.

I never split the refueling duties up to more than one person. Meaning, I don't insert the hose, walk away from the boat and then have the wife pull the fuel hose out and hang it up on the pump.

All my electronics are off when I refuel. I don't play games with combustable gases or vapors. I've seen too many boats sink because of folks not following proper procedures at the gas dock.

Now argue away guys since I've added my .02 cents! :-)

Go Army!

Drama makes the world go round!

:-)

Yes Sir! Come on over and join the fun!

A friend of mine started a new boat site for folks on the east coast around the Chesapeake Bay and Potomac Rivers. If you are from there, check it out. It's called www.WeekendPirate.com

Just wanted to pass the info along to fellow boaters! I had him put up a banner for TheBoaters.com too to do some cross promotion.

Who said the Captain is the last off of the boat!

Does anyone have links to other good boating websites? I frequent Boattest.com for reviews and the videos of the new boats. I love TheBoaters.com and the TBTV that I look forward to checking out while I'm on my lunch break at work. If anyone has any other good sites that are pertaining to boats, drop me a line.

-CaptMaxim

I love the look of the synthetic teak look but my buddy had his Maxum 2700 done last summer and it got HOT really quick. No more walking around barefoot on 90 degree days on his boat. That was my only major complaint. At least the white non-skid didn't heat up as much as the darker colors do...

I'd still buy it though. :-) Might have just added one more project to the list for the winter.

Your boat looks great, by the way!

Thanks for the info on the electrolyte levels. I'll double check them again tonight when I go back down to the boat. I'll report back and let everyone know what the problem/solution was.

I just bought the boat on Saturday. Took it out for the shake down cruise and spent the night on her... servicing the batteries was the previous owner's task up until now... that's why I decided to check the water levels when I noticed the batts weren't charging.

I pulled the manual from ProMariner and they say it should have an inline fuse for the AC... however that could be anywhere in the boat. I dig around tonight and see what I can find. I'm going to put a volt meter on the alternators and at the batteries tonight to get a more accurate reading than what the dash gauge is reading.

Thanks for the response.

I have a few questions about the battery charger on my 2002 Sea Ray 280 Sundancer. The charger is a ProMariner Flyback 20-3 Charger with 3 batteries attached to it.

Last night we stayed on the boat and had the battery switch set to "both" overnight with the generator running. When we woke up this morning to head back to the marina, the port engine wouldn't crank and the battery voltage was reading 9 volts. Obviously the charger wasn't charging the batteries overnight with the generator on. I checked the battery water levels and added 7 bottles of Deer Park water to all three of them. Thank goodness for Deer Park! I was hoping that the batteries were just low on water, hence not holding a charge well. After I used my jump box to get the boat running, the alternator voltage was just around 12 v where the starboard motor was charging at 14.4 v. I think either the alternator may be going bad or that the boat's battery charger isn't turned on or functioning correctly. The ammeter on the charger was not reading any amperage reading while plugged into Shorepower or with the generator on. That's a concern.

My last boat has a ON/OFF switch on the panel in the cabin that was for the battery charger. I can't seem to find a similar switch in this boat. Is there one or does the battery charger automatically run once AC power is supplied (either by shorepower or the generator)?

Also, does anyone know if this year boat has a fuse for the AC side of the battery charger as some do? I couldn't seem to find it while looking this morning.

Thanks!

What about doing a dual battery isolater setup? Have one side going to your cranking battery and the other going to a house battery. This way they remain seperate from each other and you can still put a switch onboard to select which one you want to power the onboard stuff with... Of course, a higher amp alternator would simply provide more amperage to the batteries when charging...

Yikes Scott! Better fill up on this side of the line when you're out cruising.

Bruce - the 6 pack was an excellent class. I highly recommend taking it if you have the opportunity. By taking that class you realize how much the other boaters around you don't know. That part is pretty scary. I took mine from a company called MERG or Marine Emergency Response Group. They travel to your location and teach the class if there are enough students. The class for me was $895 for the whole thing including all the materials. The hardest part was memorizing the Rules and Road and figuring out the navigation stuff. Once I was able to memorize all of that, I was good to go.

Thank's Capt Aaron! The rules of the road exam was the hardest one to study for... The inland vs. Internetional differences took a while to sink in!

I have yet to navigate down there by water but hopefully by the end of the summer I'll have a few trips in the log books. Let's pray that the gas prices don't get too much higher than they already are. They were at $3.85 a gallon at my marina this weekend for regular 87 octane.

Thanks for the warm welcome guys! I plan on taking a few extended trips down the ICW this summer and hitting some of our favorite destinations like Manteo and the Outer Banks. We've taking numerous vacations there by land but now that I'm able to go by boat, I'd really like to venture down that way soon.

Capt Michael Miller here from Northern, VA... just stopping in to say hello. I have a Sea Ray 280 Sundancer which is my 3rd boat. I'm 31, own a computer consulting firm that specializes in networking, Microsoft products and telecommuting solutions called Alexandria Networks. We service clients in and around the DC metro region. I also just passed my seven exams for my USCG OUPV Captain's License which I hope to upgrade to a 50 or 100 Ton masters soon. Hope to see some of you out on the Potomac river or Chesapeake Bay sometime!