What boating mistakes have you made?

[MCNPathfinder]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

Well, after reading a lot of these posts, I realize I've made a lot of mistakes that I didn't even know were mistakes. Mainly starting the boat with the skeg in trailering position. I didn't know you weren't supposed to do that! I've even put it in gear like that! I'm sure there's a "boat-load" of stuff they're going to be replacing when they do my bellows. I'm glad I added more money to my "bellows fund". I like to be cautious with things I'm not familiar with. I am not familiar with boating. I will always run my boat with the muffs on at home before bringing it to the lake (even though last season I had it out at least twice a week! LOL!). I usually go out with my brother, it's a little hard to launch a 23' cabin cruiser by myself, I'm afraid. I don't think I've ever really let it warm up at the dock either, he pretty much just let's her rip (although we run it a little at home). We've almost run out of gas before with the big one. We have run out of gas with the little one, and of course it was a choppy/windy day, lots of paddling. I don't have any way to check the oil level besides changing the oil, and it got a little low (nothing to be concerned about). The skeg was up, but not high enough so it bounced twice on the ramp. I had really crappy tires on my truck last year (rear wheel drive, unless I put it in 4), so sometimes I would purposely do some burn-outs and act like I'm a noob, just to generate some laughs and relieve some of the tenseness on the ramp with other boaters. No one expects my Pathfinder to pull my boat out. Everyone is like let me know if you need help getting that out, like it's my first time ever. LOL! Man looking over this list, my boat must HATE me! It's always been reliable, and never left me stranded, and I've treated it like crap! I'm SORRY buddy, I PROMISE I'll make it up to you!
Oops, forgot another one. I've left the keys at home at least twice. I always lock the trailer to my truck, so at one point, due to poor scheduling, I pulled the boat around all day including a trip into the cities where I go to school! LOL! Thank goodness it was my little boat and I only lose about 2MPG pulling that, rather than my big guy where I lose about 8-10MPG! LOL! I'm sure people were like WTH is this boat doing here? There's not a lake around here!
I also broke a leaf spring on my trailer once when I went over a bump, had to jerry-rig it to get it back home, but I did without any accidents. Tow companies wanted to charge about $300, including one who said it would be cheaper ($300) to tow the truck and boat (23') on a flat-bed, rather than unhook the boat trailer from the truck and just put it on a flatbed ($500). This was after I told him what vehicle I drive and the length of the boat/trailer. The guy sounded high, so rather than waiting around 3 hours for this guy (who seemed under the influence of something) or a person that he might dispatch only to have them arrive and say "I don't have a flatbed that can accomodate both vehicles". We used some wood blocks and some tie downs and got it figured out.

 

[Mel Taylor]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

Well, after reading a lot of these posts, I realize I've made a lot of mistakes that I didn't even know were mistakes.

Now that you mention mistakes that you didn't know were mistakes, I pulled a real long term boo-boo.

In 1995 I had been boating for many years. Always with 14 or 15 foot tinnies. My largest motor up to that point had been a 25 horse Johnson (or Evinrude, same-same motors with different brand names). None of my motors ever had tachometers on them. Propeller size and pitch had never been a problem. Motors had always run good as far a both high RPM operation and a trolling speeds with the props that came on them. I had a vague understanding that there were different pitch props, but had no idea of the importance of having the right pitch prop for the boat, motor and load. I didn't even know that there was such a thing as a tiny tach.

Then I bought a 1995, 30 Horse Evinrude to replace the '84 Model, 25 horse Johnson I had been running on my 1984, 14 foot Mirrocraft. The dealer slapped a 15 pitch prop on it and I never thought to question the pitch. Just didn't know any better.

I never was satisfied with the way the motor operated. Didn't give me the speed I expected and really did dismally at low RPM. If I tried to troll with it, it would constantly die on me and have to be restarted. I blamed it on the motor and often rued the day that I got rid of the old '84 model 25 horse motor. Since I didn't troll that often anyhow, I just put up with the poor performance.

In 2009 I found and joined iBoats. That's when I finally began to realize that perhaps the problem was with the prop and not with the motor itself.

Next step: Thanks to what I learned on iBoats forums, I went to a 13 pitch prop. Better performance but still not as good as I thought it should be.

After running the 13P prop for awhile I learned enough from the iBoats forums to order and install a tiny tach. It was immediately apparent that even the thirteen pitch prop wasn't sufficient and I went to an 11 pitch prop. Voila! As much difference as night and day. For the first time I got the RPMs up to where they should be at WOT. Low speed operation became a pleasure instead of an aggravation.

I had essentially been lugging the engine every time I operated it for all those years.

Did I do any harm to it? Perhaps shorten the life if nothing else? I don't know. I still doesn't get the speed I think it should, but the carburetor hasn't been touched since I bought the motor and I think the next step may be to have the carburetor rebuilt to see how that affects performance. Quite frankly, I'm afraid to check compression. Afraid I might find out something I don't want to know.

 

[Rockmere1]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

Anyway there's nothing wrong with making mistakes; it proves you're active. Not learning from them is the problem.

Amen To That!!

A wise man once told me, "He Who Makes No Mistakes Does Nothing"

 

[R Socey]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

The worst thing I ever did was to take out guys that weren't serious about fishing - never again!
Let people consume alchohol - never again!
I bought two boats that were too small - never again!
I lost a $1,000.00 fishing rod/reel fishing for catfish - never again!
I ran aground doing 43mph - that sucked!
Forgot my rods,vest, licence,net,gaff,keys,bug spray,bait,hooks,steel leaders,maps,phone,food,drink, sun screen,camera,binoculars,2 stroke oil, list of things not to forget,etc.
I left the plug out.
Forgot to unstrap.
The normal stuff.

 

[Home Cookin']

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

One of he more embarssing things was I forgot to lock the outboard down. I was at my brothers, his home is on the river and I was showing off coming into his dock. My intent was to come in "Hot", hit reverse and come to a stop next to the dock and let everyone marvel at my boat handling.

what was stupid was coming in "hot". Using the reverse for a brake is how to tear up your lower unit gears. Good boaters use reverse for a brake only at the slowest speeds just to fine tune, and never ever going straight from forward to reverse. Only occasionally, when you underestimate your speed, current, load, etc. will you use a hard reverse. And when the boat is going forward in neutral, the prop is still spinning "forward."
I bet 80% of the people who own boats don't know or do this, but they were never taught properly by experienced boaters. They approach a dock, etc. in forward idle instead of coasting in N. Or worse, they come in "hot." Sheesh.

As a young boy, I learned on a boat that the reverse didn't really work. I also learned to drive beach trucks with no brakes--same principle, easing in neutral into the dock or garage, bumping the gears as needed. It's all about the soft touch.

 

[kfa4303]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

plug out at ramp, line around prop, snapped head off of spark plug, flat tire on the truck after a day on the water, too many submerged stumps to count, all the basics. Still in one piece so far, and at lest I'm not making the same mistakes twice......usually

 

[bigriver79]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

My buddy forgot to latch the trailer on the ball one night before going frogging. We drive a few miles to the ramp and pull in to realize there was no boat behind the truck! Found it about half way back home about 100 yards off in a cotton field, undamaged. That was a long time ago though, we were kids.

 

[cmcbob]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

thanks for the laughs made me feel good . me well when we lived in santa anna ca my wife let me ,note let me buy my first new boat 16' tri hull 60hp , we had thetruck packed down with fishing gear food drinks three kids plenty of diapers and ready to go . we stop by boat shop they hook up lites check them out and were on our way to the lake lake issabell about 70 miles away , we get to ramp back down i slide boat off ,she holds on to rope while i go park truck and trailor ,probably 200yards away , come back we all climb in boat ,,,,,and no keys the boat people for got to put them back in boat ,, offered guy at marina 50.00 to hot wire ,said he couldnt ,so 70mi back ,,needless to say she still brings it up 30 years later.

 

[powell0819]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

Oh boy. Hmm. Here we go.

Just last week, I (the Mrs.), was spraying starting fluid in the carb of our 120 merc on a 35 degree morning trying to get it started for the season after replacing some fuel lines ect while the Mr. Was cranking it over. Kept spraying... spraying.. hmm its smoking so I KEPT SPRAYING then BOOM it shot up a decent size flame at my face, caught the end of the starter fluid cap on fire and started the carb on fire on the inside. Seeing as we had no fire extinguisher yet since we threw it away at the end of season I blew on the fire trying to get it out. It went out and WOW will NEVER do that again!!!! Thankfully it appears everything is fine and we didn't blow up

Also at wot through an area of truman lake we didn't know. Had just installed our depth finder and thought it was malfunctioning when it said 3 -4 feet deep. Stopped the boat, stuck and oar down and yeah, it was working right! We got lucky!!!

And ofcourse left straps on, plug out and have done our fair share of dock collisions. Our poor boat must hate us

 

[tomdinwv]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

Oh boy. Hmm. Here we go.

Just last week, I (the Mrs.), was spraying starting fluid in the carb of our 120 merc on a 35 degree morning trying to get it started for the season after replacing some fuel lines ect while the Mr. Was cranking it over. Kept spraying... spraying.. hmm its smoking so I KEPT SPRAYING then BOOM it shot up a decent size flame at my face, caught the end of the starter fluid cap on fire and started the carb on fire on the inside. Seeing as we had no fire extinguisher yet since we threw it away at the end of season I blew on the fire trying to get it out. It went out and WOW will NEVER do that again!!!! Thankfully it appears everything is fine and we didn't blow up

Also at wot through an area of truman lake we didn't know. Had just installed our depth finder and thought it was malfunctioning when it said 3 -4 feet deep. Stopped the boat, stuck and oar down and yeah, it was working right! We got lucky!!!

And ofcourse left straps on, plug out and have done our fair share of dock collisions. Our poor boat must hate us

WOW! You got lucky with the starting fluid and carb backfire. I've seen people get burned pretty bad when that happens. You must be living right. Glad you didn't get hurt and your boat didn't get damaged.

 

[powell0819]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

WOW! You got lucky with the starting fluid and carb backfire. I've seen people get burned pretty bad when that happens. You must be living right. Glad you didn't get hurt and your boat didn't get damaged.

yeah got lucky with that one. Our boat has been good to us so far so I almost cried when I saw the carb on fire like that but yeah thankfully everythings okay I'm just glad the neighbors weren't outside to see it happen then laugh at us lol it was pretty comical especially with me throwing stuff and waving my arms around yelling fire! 'LOL

 

[chris.j.marshall]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

Bought my boat used and never bothered to check trailer bearings. Driver side bearings failed while going down the highway on what would have been my last time out that season. Luckily I wasn't far from home and wasn't in the middle of boating season. Once I got the hubs off, I couldn't believe I made it all season.

 

[ohio river rat in KY]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

our 1st boat hydro sport with 80 manier. someone took the big gas tank out and put in two 6 gal. tanks in, well it was around the first of feb. cold wet sletting, but had to try it out, fired it up run like a top for about 5 mins down river and burrr so fired it back up and burrr, well i for got to open the air screw on the gas tank, and it did not run right from then on out.
went campn on a island here and woke up with the boat half way dry docked from the barge waves over night.....so pretty lucky

 

[Ryanlewis2010]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

Well so after reading this thread and not had yet to splash a boat that i owned i made a checklist to make sure what not to do so everything would go fine. so i started on the list b4 backing on to the ramp, straps off , plug, fired the engine up at home, put keys in boat, spare battery coil tools life jackets etc. everything is goin good splash the boat fires up nice start reversing everything goin good untill i wanted to go forward it was stuck in reverse long story short i took it over to my marina, again with the check list (lucky the dock is on the other side of the marina) got the shifter fixed PO took the shifter nut off that connected the shift cable to the lever via cotter pin. mean while i put back the throttle and shifter stuff back together inside the boat while he finished the stuff on the drive.

So i launch again everything fine till engine gets stuck out of gear again, so i pull it out thinking his fix failed meanwhile i drag the skeg and prop thru the dirt heading into the marina and bent the prop a lil (fixed it already) so i went home and realize his fix was still intact and then it hits me i left a cotter pin out on the sift cable in the control box.

So there is my book of what i did wrong on my first day on the water lol

 

[GrandDad]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

OK, somehow I got to thinking today about the worst mistake I ever made - and it really didnt sound like a mistake at first.

Our last boat was a 30-foot double cabin Carver that we had at a marina a mile from our house. Luckily, my brother had his boat in the next slip. One Friday, while I was away on travel, I got a call from my brother who said, "I am at the marina and your boat is sinking! The swim platform is several inches under water." That in itself wasn't the mistake - however, not leaving a key to the cabins with either the marina or my brother was!

Even so, they were able to break the locks and pump out six to eight inches of water from the aft cabin and an inch or two from the forward cabin before they were able to discover and repair a leaking shaft.

I guess in hindsight, the other mistake was trusting the surveryor, when I bought the boat, to discover that 2 of the 3 bilge pumps were improperly wired and didn't work when the battery switch was in the off position. Luckily, there was no damage to the electrical connections or the engines/transmissions - and we had plans to replace the carpet anyhow!

 

[GrandDad]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

I almost forgot about the more-embarrassing mistake - taking a large group of family out and forgetting to unplug the shore power connection before backing out of the slip. You just can't get very far when you are still attached to the marina!

 

[Rumley]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

1) I had a 12ft jet star with a 72 40hp Johnson. After 2 years of it not running it ran great on the muffs, brought it to the lake with a few friends, my friend hooked up the gas tank and we started cranking it over. No matter what it wouldn't start. Killed the battery turning it over. My friend decides to boost it with his diesel truck. Burnt the starter trying to start it. Bring it back to the house, my friend connected the hose backwards. Rebuild the starter, hook the gas line up properly started no problem.
2) bought a boat without a decent inspection, 4000$ later and I have a newly rebuilt 1975 caravelle with new floor, stringers and just about anything else you can think of, drive it maybe 6 times and get 2footitis and 100hp itis lol.
3) buy new bigger faster boat, decide to change impeller to be safe, must have put it in backwards, melt waterpump, and now have low compression in 1 cylinder (maybe unrelated?) so in my 3 boats I have owned I have gone out maybe 8 times in 6 years. This is the year, either a head gasket or a new engine, not sure which but I will be boating this summer, only 2 more months to go

 

[River_Lizard]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

1) so in my 3 boats I have owned I have gone out maybe 8 times in 6 years.

I think someone is trying to tell you something......... boating might not be your thing!!! :facepalm:

 

[Mel Taylor]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

I think someone is trying to tell you something......... boating might not be your thing!!! :facepalm:

There was a period of time in my life when I only went boating a few times a year too. Other things in my life had to take precedence during those years. But, I never let the dream die. Eventually, things changed and the dream is again live and well and I make regular trips to one lake or another during our long boating season every year.

 

[River_Lizard]

Re: What boating mistakes have you made?

I don't think you read all of Ramley's posting before you responded to mine....if you did read it, then you're not getting it.