BUDGET 12ft JON BOAT MODIFICATION! 

Me too man. Shouldn’t have sold mine.

I did, don’t recommend it though

Woah wait really?? Haha I've never seen that! Could you email me some pictures?

yea.. i have the same exact boat and am trying to get it to ride higher in the water.. could you send some photos my way?

Do it Randy!

Awesome man thanks for checking it out! Let me know how it turns out!

Do it!

Thank You!

i cut them haha then soldered the 8 gauge to it

Thanks!

+FIREANT FISHING on the rear deck..did you run the 3/4 board from on top of the entire back seat to the rear? Please advise

+SoN oFaBleepBlop Yup sure did! I stopped maybe 2 inches before the transom incase I was going to put a trolling motor on there

+FIREANT FISHING thanks for the reply bud....did you bolt/screw the board to the seat or is it just on top of it ? If you did bolt what size and type of screw/bolt ? and how many? Also did you do the same on the front? Board on top of front deck all the way to the top of middle seat? And bracing did you do between the front deck and middle seat? Im planing to do this on a 16 cresliner mod v and out of all the videos seems like yours is the most easy and effective way..its simple nothing fancy just how i like it.

+SoN oFaBleepBlop Man I wish I still had this thing bc a video would be more helpful haha but the back is simply the 3/4" ply wood that ran to the back. No "framing" at all. I did use a 2x4 on each side as a support beam to the bottom of the boat. They were wedged in there, then 2 screws from the top of the deck down into the 2x4. i did screw about 4 screws into the original seat to keep it secure to the boat. The front is different, basically I made a frame with 2x4 in-between the front of the seat, to the little lip up front (this boat had a little aluminum seat type deal up front that was hollow) that ran horizontal-no screws into the seat Then I ran 2 more 2x4 "vertically" into the 2x4 that were horizontal to the seats using joists for the 2x4 to sit in Once that was done and sitting in place, the deck was cut and placed in its final spot, and then i screwed the top of the deck down into the frame. This way, i could take the deck and frame out as one piece to carpet it. The front deck was 100% removable and was NOT screwed into the boat As far as the size of screws I'm not really sure what i used, but i think they were deck screws. I also don't remember exactly how many, but i know it wasn't a lot. Because it just sat in there, it didn't need much. If you haven't already, check out my channel bc i am currently working on a 16' aluminum Fisher Marine, i am doing much more work to it hoping for a better and more efficient turn out. If i was to redo this project on this 12'er, i would use angled aluminum and rivets instead of 2x4 and screws simply to reduce weight, this thing got mighty heavy and sat lower in the water Hope that helps a little!

thanks man!

Not on this boat I didnt

To be honest man, I'm not exactly sure of the width on this one, I want to say at the bottom it was 36" or something around there? It really depends on what your using it for and how many people will be in it. By myself it worked great, if you wanted to do these mods very similar to this, and plan to have 2 people, I would get a 14' looking back on it and then just put in shorter seat pedestals. I also would use 1/8 dia angled aluminum for the frame instead of wood, like what I'm doing with the 16'er now. Those vids are on my channel if your interested in checking them out

I'm not sure of an exact number, but if I had to guess it was prob around $250 or more. I do remember that this boat needed a lot more paint than I originally expected. But the whole thing only took a few months at most. Could have been done faster though, I just worked on it in my spare time

+Durrone Burgess I wish I could tell ya haha, but I did sell this boat and now I am working on a 16' aluminum Fisher Marine. If your interested, the videos are on my channel! Thanks for the support!

We are onto float pods now haha

Bass Merica Thanks man! Do it!!! I had a blast building it and learned a lot. If you ever have any questions just let me know, good luck!

Thanks Rob! Where are you at?

Awesome Victor!

awesome man its pretty fun!

Everything was pressure fitted between the original seats in the boat, so the decks were removable if i needed them to

Thanks!

+Ravila Bowen Motor Guide 12V 45lb thrust 36" foot control, its the only one i had on this boat and it worked pretty well, next time i would go with one a little bigger i think or just get one for the back

Yeah, the livewell was one reason, another was bc it was really short and just not big enough. One big thing i noticed with the wood was it seemed to be top heavy and liked to "pitch" and "roll" really easily if you weren't directly in the middle. The way i made it, there was only the one hatch up front so i had room under there it just wasn't easy to get to all the time on the water. i did use 2x4 for the framing so if i did this again i would go with a smaller wood to frame like a 1x2, and also the 3/4" ply wood was overkill in my opinion so i would go to 1/2. i also should have used longer screws to keep those seat pedestal mounts in place, they did tend to pull out a little bit from leaning in the seat. i thought about building "pontoons" to put on the sides to help with stability, but i had already decided to upgrade so never did. Is your boat just a bigger version of this one(with the built in seats like that) or did it come as a smaller crappie or bass boat like my newest one? hope this helps some

Dude... this helps alot. Mine is a Tracker 1542 jon boat (15 feet long by 42 wide?) so is 3 feet longer than your old 12 footer and just a little shorter than your newest one. It has the 3 bench seats. I'm thinking of doing my deck support with aluminum like your new one. For my seat... I think I'm going to cut a metal plate the size of the base and have it inside the bench and run bolts through instead of screws? I'll have to cut a hole in the side of the bench and remove some foam, but I think it will make the seat very sturdy. I can refill with spray foam and rivet a new sheet of metal over the hole I cut out. Still thinking.

Im kinda surprised that boat is a little shaky in the water?? I wouldn't expect it to be. I think my 16' is just under 60" wide(at the top), not exactly sure though. if your boat is anything like my 12, even by adding wood its still going to be a little shaky. Another idea would be to remove the bench seats completely, then just fill in the floor of the boat with sheets of foam, and just build a nice floor in the bottom that just rests on top of the foam and have compartments built on top of that for storage. that way, your center of gravity is lower and might help with the stability. In one of Micheal Lopez's videos, he showed and explained why not to use the spray foam. Basically it is porous and holds water, just keep that in mind. I don't think i would use it for more than just a little fill in area. The bolts for the seats would work much better than screws though

I think it's shaky because it's built to hold up to 3 people (400 pound people weight) and 775 pound max weight. And I only have a trolling motor and two batteries and me. And some rods fishing gear. So right now I sit in the back as that's where the trolling motor is. All the weight in the boat is in the back, with absolutely no weight in the front. So when I try to step over the middle seat, it feels a little squirrelly? I'm hoping that when I have a little more weight (especially in the front) that it will be a little more stable. I mean, mine is close to 60" wide at the top also, and 15' so I would like to think mine will be nearly as stable as yours. Regardless... it's what I have and I'm going to have to make the most of it. I think with a front deck, and storage up front, I'll have room and it'll be stable enough not to dump me out. lol. Thanks for the responses man... I appreciate it.

i honestly do not remember haha i wish i did. i did this build a few years ago. i want to say it was like 36" wide on the bottom?

I can't remember exactly what spray paint i used? I don't think it was anything special. I did put on 2 coats of primer though before the paint, inside and out. I hope this helps a little!

Thanks! love your videos!

i used a long enough screw that it went into the bench seat, but mostly it was attached to ply wood. p.s. i don't recommend doing that, it didn't work haha

36

Depends on the size of adults haha. It didn't do too well with 2 people, but it was possible.

How much weight would u say

About 350-370 maybe? Thats a rough guess of two people in it, not including gear and batteries

i think i used bolts, then on the top of the existing aluminum seat i cut holes where the bottom of the bolt and nut would sit

It might a little bit, on this boat I did not remove any of the foam that it came with, I just added the sheets in the middle. The 16' fisher marine that I am currently working on does have the all the foam removed and I'm not going to use any of the foam that was factory with the boat, however I am going to add foam, just not as much. I've been told that the foam in a boat isn't so much to help it float in the water, but to help keep it afloat if it was to take on water

Yessir it was

I did haha working on it now