20' Hobie Conversion

[PanCrazy]

Hi all,

I am new to the site and need some advice on a conversion. Recently I purchased a 20' Hobie Miracle and plan to convert it to a pontoon pleasure/fish. I realize that my total weight is around 1200-1300 pounds so I need the lightest building materials possible. I have located aluminum 2 x 3's for the frame and plan to use marine ply and carpet for the deck. I plan to create a slide show vid for the project when completed. Here is my list of questions, and help with them would be greatly appreciated:

Is there alternative to to cover the deck other than carpet?

What's the smallest outboard that uses cable connections? (maybe a dumb question)

Lightweight seating and console?

Don't really want to spend $1500 on pontoon rail system, any ideas?


Thanks

 

[andgott]

Re: 20' Hobie Conversion

I saw a 18' hobie that was converted into a pontoon boat of sorts- Kind of neat, it had twin minn-kota trolling motors for power. Those cat hulls don't take much to push 'em, especially if you are OK with going SLOW... He could cruise all day at 6-7 MPH without a recharge.

He installed a deck system on the existing framework, I think he used aluminum frame material, and a ply deck. The deck was covered in marine vinyl flooring material. He built seating, not sure how it would compare weight wise to purchased seating.

You can get pretty small motors with remote hookups- Sailboats use them... I'm not up on current models, though, so I wouldn't know what size or what manufacturer is building them. You can also adapt virtually any motor to remote control, if you are at least mildly handy. There really isn't much to it.

-Andrew

 

[PanCrazy]

Re: 20' Hobie Conversion

I saw a 18' hobie that was converted into a pontoon boat of sorts- Kind of neat, it had twin minn-kota trolling motors for power. Those cat hulls don't take much to push 'em, especially if you are OK with going SLOW... He could cruise all day at 6-7 MPH without a recharge.

He installed a deck system on the existing framework, I think he used aluminum frame material, and a ply deck. The deck was covered in marine vinyl flooring material. He built seating, not sure how it would compare weight wise to purchased seating.

You can get pretty small motors with remote hookups- Sailboats use them... I'm not up on current models, though, so I wouldn't know what size or what manufacturer is building them. You can also adapt virtually any motor to remote control, if you are at least mildly handy. There really isn't much to it.

-Andrew

Thanks.

I have to do some research on the vinyl flooring. I want to build the boat but don't really want it to look like I built it. The main reason I chose the cats is because of their weight. I have a newer v6 Equinox and don't want to buy a truck just to pull a boat. I know they have trolling tabs I could mount, but a 10 hp should zip those cats pretty good.