Well I’ve decided to get back into fishing again. I picked up a nice used 15′ Alweld Jon Boat for a decent price. First thing i had to do is start looking for an outboard engine and boat trailer. One thing I discovered really quick is that the price of boat equipment has shot through the roof. New small outboard engines are ridiculous and start out at $3,500 and up.. I was hoping to do this on a low end budget. So i started doing some searching and found a Hangkai 18HP 2 Stroke for roughly $1,200 delivered to my door from Amazon. Before pulling the trigger, I did some research and found out these are copies of the Yamaha 15HP 2 Stroke. Come to find out, these engines have been good and reliable little engines so i pulled the trigger on it. The engine arrived at my house via FedEx in three days. When i opened the box I was surprised how well built it looked. It included the fuel tank, fuel line, extra set of spark plugs, emergency pull rope, tool kit, impeller and gaskets. Once i built a stand to mount the motor on, I did my first startup. First thing I did was filled the foot with gear oil as per instructions. I used a 25:1 mixture with two stroke oil. Once I hooked water up, i pumped up the fuel bulb, pulled out the choke and gave it a good pull on the rope. She started right up on the first pull. I’m really impressed now.
My next challenge was finding a trailer. I was looking for a good used trailer but everything i ran across was either junk or had no title to be able to get registered in my name. I started looking at new boat trailers but wasn’t going to spend the $1,700 + prices they were asking for. I ended up ordering a 5′ x 8′ Trailer kit from Northern Tool costing me about $450 after getting $100 in gift cards. I figured I’d make me a multi use trailer that i could use for also hauling cargo like my motorcycle or UTV when needed. I’m still waiting on delivery. My plan is to extend the tongue with 3×3 square tubing to make it long enough for the boat then deck the 5; x 8′ deck with 5/4 x 6 treated decking. I’ll update when it complete that. Stay tuned……
