Strawberry 8/5 maiden voyage

[Kent]

It was the best of times and it was the worst of times. We caught our fair share of fish and Billy caught a few more than his fair share.[] Caught a few trolling, but caught most of them vertically jigging in 36 to 40 feet of water. The trolling motor would keep dieing if we tried to run slower than about 2.5 mph. Caused me to lose my prescription glasses when they fell overboard while I was pulling on the starter rope. The large outboard would never get up to top RPMS and it slowed way down a few times. Thought it had totally died on me when it quit when I was just getting ready to trailer the boat. Ended up using the trolling motor to navigate through all of the boats in the marina that were also trying to get out before the storm hit – not fun. Found out in the parking lot that the only problem was that the temporary six-gallon gas tank that I was using had run dry. Frustrating because I had two gallons of extra fuel onboard and also I could have switched to the trolling motor fuel tank. Never could figure out how to use the Bottom Line 310 fish finder (even with reading the manual). If anyone is familiar with that fish finder I would be grateful for some tutoring on it.
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[ocean]

Hey i would call that decent day .Except for loosing your glasses looks like everything went pretty ok.At least you didnt get strande out there in the middle of the lake!How big were the fish you guys caught?
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[Kent]

The largest was a heavy cutt right at 22 inches. Most were 18 to 20 inchers -- and all were cutts.
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[Theekillerbee]

Sounds like a very up and down day Kent. Glad you guys made it back safely though. Do you think it was a fuel problem all along with the big motor?
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[Fishcrazy]

Kent-Glad you got her out for a first try,sometimes on older boats I have had to run injector cleaner thru them to clean out gummed up carbs
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[MGB]

Bet it felt good to get back on the water. I am going to give the berry a try tomorrow. Thanks for the report.
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[Bigcat]

Kent,
Nice to get to meet you at the dock. Sorry the timing wasn't better. With the storm rolling in and trouble holding the boat and all you had been through you seemed a bit frazzled. I recognized your boat from your posts a few week back so I thought I would take the opportunity to say hi and see how the fishing was. Sorry things didn't go better today for you but at least you got fish!

We launched about 4:30 and headed over by the knowles with threatning clouds and wind chopped water. We tried several locations over there and caught a few. The wind died down after about 30 minutes and the water was like glass. About 6:30 we moved closer to the ladders and it was game on. For the next 1.5 hours the three of us (me, my dad, and my brother) got into fish almost non stop. Then the wind came up again and blew us off our spot and the next 1/2 hour we got a few but not as many. We headed to the dock right before dark. We finished the afternoon with 25 fish with most of those caught between 6:30 and 8:00. We found the fish between 32 and 45 feet but caught most of them in 34 feet. We vertical jigged with tube jigs and a minnow worked better then worms for sweetener on the hook. Water temp 67 degree's. I wish I could have stayed and fished for a few hours after dark but had to get back. Another good day on the berry!
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[wiperhunter2]

Not bad for the first trip in the boat. I'm sure you will work all the bugs out, givin enough time[]. Did the boat seem a lot roomier than the old one? What was your top speed and RPM?
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[Kent]

Lots more room in the boat -- which was a big plus. It may be gummy parts that just need a good cleaning -- but what do I know. Top speed was 13 mph (briefly) and usually it was 10 mph. Top RPMs was 5,000 and most often about 4,500 and once it slowed down to 2,000 RPM. Anyone have any idea how many RPMs an older 100 horse Mercury should do?
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[wiperhunter2]

Lee told me an older Mercury should run at 5500rpm depending on how close your gage is. I had Lee check mine and it was 300rpm off, so mine reads 5800rpm at full throttle. It sounds like your floats might be out of adjustment, you might be dumping too much raw fuel into your engine. Be careful not to use the motor too much if that is the case, it could cause your engine to blow up. Hopefully your problem is simpler but don't push it to hard until you know for sure.
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[lunkerhunter2]

I feel your pain Kent. Just when i fix one problem and think all is well something else(usually stupid stuff) goes haywire. The last problem was the Power-pack and it cost me $150. Before that was a $40 coil and also the plugs once and i think again now that it seems to be running right. Good luck.
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[Kent]

[size 1]"you seemed a bit frazzled"[/size]
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[size 1]Not so, I was a lot frazzled.[pirate] Never fun to have boat problems, combined with lots of wind in the marina, the chance of ligtning moving in, combined with the marina full of boats, and then trying to trailer a boat for the first time. I didn't realize that the fun was just beginning until the main outboard died and we were being blown towards the rocks. Fortunately, the trolling motor fired up, but trolling motors are no substitute for the main outboard when attempting to trailer the boat. Billy was kind enough to go wading to get the boat lined up to get it on the trailer. It was a pleasure meeting you Bigcat, sorry that I couldn't be a little more sociable and I do appreciate your kind offer to help any way that you could.[/size]
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[Bigcat]

Kent,
Hopefully next time we meet up it will be under more favorable circumstances!!!!! I hope you get your boat woes worked out. I personally think if you sand off that red stripe and paint it blue the motor will miraculously start working better and a windshield wiper will magically appear! []
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[TubeDude]

[cool][#0000ff]Sorry about the shaky "shake-down" cruise. At least you did not have MGB along to credit for your misfortunes.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Bummer about the glasses. Hope you can get the big motor tuned up and running smooth.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Wanna go tubing? Can't remember ever having those kind of problems. Not much speed but easy to trailer at the end of the day.[/#0000ff]
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[N.E.T.O.]

Hey Kent!
We looked for you on Saturday but I didn't see you. It takes a few trips to get the bugs worked out of a new boat...even if if they really aren't bugs! Just takes some getting used to...ask me how I know! (note to self: Rembember to check the safety lanyard when the engine won't start!)
I don't know for what altitude the boat was set up for but on my Merc 20 on my little 14 footer, I had to rejet to get it to run at Strawberry. Jets were cheap ($4.00) and it only takes a few minutes to change them on mine. Runs like a champ now. My buddie's boat required a prop change however. It ran fine (although slightly lower RPM's) at Utah Lake, but would only do 3300 ish rpms on Strawberry. New lower pitch prop and now he's in the 4000ish range, which is still a little low, but the boat now planes and went from 13 mph before (not planing) to 25 mph now!
So it might be the prop, or the jets, or both...or neither.
I'm still working the bugs out of my boat also!
Randy
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