What grease for inside of winch???

As soon as you have to charge your gas and you cant pay it off in whole at the end of each month. Because then you would be paying interest on gas!

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it might become a lawn ornament if we hit $6/gallon (the new 2010 estimate from our revered “oil analysts”).

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And I just sold my two canoes.

I sold my Crestliner 1850 FishHawk last year and went to a 14′ Lund. I’ve been fighting the urge to look at bigger boats, but every time I look at the numbers on the gouging machine, I mean, pump, that almost kills my desire to even get to the lake anymore.

I guess that is a choice each of us has to make based on individual circumstances. To me I plan to keep doing what I do until I no longer can. I hate to let the oil companies and the government win. I have slowed down some in my driving, it helps a little. If the government was serious about slowing down consumption immediately they would have already invoked a mandatory 55 MPH like they did back in the 70’s. It worked then and would work now even though I hate it.

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To me I plan to keep doing what I do until I no longer can. I hate to let the oil companies and the government win.

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That’s been my philosophy all along. But, I think the oil companies are already winning when it takes me $240 to fill the boat.

The question for me is do I sell the boat now and try to get rid of it before the situation gets worse, or wait it out? A couple years from now, if this trend continues, my $35K boat might be worth a half-pound of jumbo leaches. I’ll have to trade UP to get a 14 footer w/ a 25 hp!

I actually traded down this winter. I had an 18′ Champion Fishhunter with a 150 Merc EFI a 9.9 Suzuki 4 stroke kicker and more. I went to a 16′ modified flat with a 25 Merc EFI 4 stroke.

My main reason for downsizing was that I had another big water boat that I could use any time I wanted. There were other benefits as well. It’s about 50 times easier to load and unload the Jon boat then the big glass rig. I can tow the Jon boat with my car (which saves a good chunk in gas). A Jon boat is like a clean slate, you can do whatever you want to it.

I added a bilge, livewell pump, Lowrance 334C, wireless bow mount, 6 ram rod holders and more. I’m going to put a deck on it from the middle bench all the way to the tip of the bow. Once this is all said and done, I’ll have a pretty sweet river machine with a bunch of storage. I get almost 30mph downstream and about 25mph upstream. That’s not as fast as I used to go, but I still get where I’m going.

I guess the moral of my story is that you can still have a lot of the bells and whistles without the 50K price tag. On the other hand, I’d never take my small boat out on Green Bay, Erie etc… But that’s what friends are for.

It is funny, but this year, I have sold more large boats than ever. 90 HP and up… go figure…

well the other thing to think about and it is hard to do, but only run half or 3/4 throttle when on plane, help conserve gas. I am starting to do that as well, I also never fill up my boat, I just put a little in each time I go fishing, that way it will eventually be full. $20 here $30 here and guess what, I will have a full tank soon enough, if not, I know I have enough gas for the day of fishing.

shane

I went from a Nitro with a 115 down to a 16′ flat with a 25 hp four stroke.
While I do miss the speed, I don’t miss the gas bill. It is nice to be able to go a half dozen trips on 6 gallons of gas.

How much do you really “save” on the water ? I have no idea, what my boat gets for MPG/HPG . I fill mine up 3 times a year at most. It runs about $50 or so a fill up. So about $150 in gas, to run all summer in a big boat, compared to what ….? maybe $50 to run in a small boat ? I will spend the hondo to be able to get around quicker and I fish Mille Lacs alot, so I would say safer too…. as far as pulling a bigger boat, I would guess I might save maybe 1 or 2 MPG better with a lighter rig, so a trip to Mille Lacs is 80 miles, maybe 1 gallon more each way, at $3.80 a gallon, that’s $7.60. Now compare that to when gas was $1.90, it has doubled, so I figure it costs me $75 more in boat gas for the year and $3.80 per trip, no problem yet.

big G

Let’s put it this way. I can’t even afford to give my two cents on this subject!

FWIW I haven’t got my “big” boat out at all last year and have no intentions to get it out this year. To be honest I’m concentrating on making money so I can fish next year and the year after when others can’t. That way I’ll have the lakes and rivers to myself!

I have a 1650 Lund Angler with a 2 stroke 40 HP and a T8 kicker. My Angler is rated for a 90 HP, even with gas getting higher I still want to eventually upgrade to a 2 stroke 90 HP as I run the T8 most of the day trolling and just use the main motor to get from spot to spot. I am not too worried about the 90 HP using more gas in fact I think I will not notice that much difference as the 90 HP will not have to work as hard as the 40 HP to push the boat.

With 2 boats, sounds like your alright….

big G

How about dual-size? I have a 2005 Lowe 1648MT that is 16′ long and the floor is 48″ wide the beam is like 72″ and the transom is 15″ Like B Robinson said there is not anything that I cannot do this boat. I put a deck forward of the middle seat/livewell and a floor behind it. Two humminbird fish finders and a cheap 5 speed minn-kota 40 pound bow mount. A 2 1/2 gallon tank can last me 2 or 3 trips on Hillsdale lake with my 1986 30HP Evinrude that will push the boat 30 mph or as slow as .6 mph. On the really windy days the wind will push it too fast to drift but the minn-kota usually will slow it down enough to slip along. If I want to stay dry I just have to keep my speed slow enough that the floor doesn’t slap the waves.

I keep my 1993 Nitro when I want to travel in more comfort. I do not plan to fill the 37 gallon tank, just too heavy. I usually keep my speed at about 30 mph to conserve gas.

My wifes Ranger can pull the Lowe but I have to use my F250 to pull the Nitro, it is just too heavy for her truck. And when I pull the Lowe with my truck you can hardly tell it is there.

It is nice having two boats.

Good question. I won’t sell my fishing boat (115 hp Johnson), but I will be using my pontoon boat (40 hp 4 stroke) for most of the year. I can run my pontoon boat almost non-stop for the remainder of the year and will maybe go through 2 tank fulls of gas. I took my fishing boat out last weekend and went from Afton to the Kinni back up to Hudson and then back to Afton. Filled up again afterwards and it cost just shy of 35.00. Thats only 30 – 40 miles. I’ll be laughing at my buddies pulling their kids on the tubes this summer.

A big part of my downsize was ease of use. Loading and unloading a 3000 lb boat/motor package can be a chore for one person. I fish by myself most of the time, and it’s also a lot easier to launch my mv 1648 in this high water.

The big rigs had to launch about 7 miles downstream from the dam a good part of this spring and drive up. I launched about 200 yards and drove up. There are definately pros and cons to both. Like I said earlier, I would never consider running my jon boat on really big water, but it sure works nice on the Mississippi.

Good question. Not sure if down sizing my boat would make that much of a savings on fuel and expenses. Down sizing the number of fishing trips is more likely to save money. A day trip to pool 2 runs me about $75 in fuel and expenses. A day trip to the croix is a little less at around $50. That is at least double what it was just a few years ago. Throw in that my income is at best about half of what it was just a few years back and something has got to give. Plans for me this summer are to make fewer but longer fishing trips and try to pair up on more trips to help expenses. Guess the times couldn’t stay good for ever.

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Plans for me this summer are to make fewer but longer fishing trips and try to pair up on more trips to help expenses.

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Good ideas here. My biggest expense isn’t the boat gas, it’s getting the boat to/from the lake. Doubt I’ll be taking many solo trips to Mille Lacs this summer.

I’ll also be staying at the resorts more often. I live about 60 mi from Mille Lacs so I’ve driven back/forth two days in a row many times. Not this year. I’d rather give my money to a resort than the coffers of Big Oil.

Pulling my 17 and a half foot boat with my truck I get 11 to the gallon. Without the boat I get 18. When I pull my buddies tin can 14 footer I get 15 to the gallon. This is all according to the mpg gauge on the truck. I am strongly considering downsizing. I don’t use a lot of fuel in the boat but the truck inhales it. So according to my research downsizing makes perfect sense. Or should I say $ cents, hahaha?

Have my winch torn down right now. Wouldn’t take cable in, and found a gear was bad. Ordered the gear from Warn, and it is on the way. Wondering what grease to use on gears when I put it back together. It is a Warn 2.5ci. Sure I could get something from Warn, but want to save a few bucks this time of year. Would a grease used for packing bearings work? Then I would have another use for the extra grease later. Sounds like we have a pile of snow coming and want the plow up and running. Thanks in advance for advise!

Nut

Synthetic NL2, from what I have read. Don’t goop it in there, just enough to coat parts lightly.