Hey there.. looking at getting my first boat!

[4x15mph]

Enjoy the boat. You sure did get this quickly along with getting it wet.

 

[jonw9]

Congrats on the new boat, and disregard everything I previously said.

Enjoy the heck out of it for the rest of the season.

 

[Boat Crazy]

Other things I learned today.. disconnect wiring before putting trailer in water.. haha.. trim up when towing, trim down when taking off and trim up for max speed.

Congratulations on your new toy. Check out the tips and ideas section of this forum. There should be some prep charts that you could modify to help you out. As for the trim, as you get more use to it, you will be able to feel the proper adjustment as you boat. The proper trim, will get you, max speed, for the RPM you are traveling. You can hear it.

 

[ScarabMike]

Congrats on your purchase. As far as your skeg, this is what I did with mine on my Sea Ray. Its called a skeg Guard.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Skeg-Guard-Skeggard-Inboard-Outboard-Boat-Marine-/321482687607?pt=Boat_Parts_Accessories_Gear&hash=item4ad9dc8477&vxp=mtr

Its easy to do, and it holds up very well. Also get a stainless prop. I suppose you have an Alpha one drive on that Merc. I had a 21" Vengance prop on mine. Its a great all around prop. Also, looking at your pictures, you need to check your sacrificial anodes. You can replace them fairly cheap. Good luck!

 

[jjdurrant]

Thanks all! I LOVE this community. I frequent many forums and this is the most friendly and helpful by far! The only two gauges not working right are the RPMs and Fuel. Both just randomly bounce around.

Spent six hours in the boat today and felt MUCH more comfortable. No damage and I even drive the boat on the trailer this time.

What is the ideal oil pressure and temp?
Routine maintenance I need to stay on top of?
Do you run the engine at all after you pull it out of the water to clean anything out?
I noticed there is still power even with the key off. This normal?
Does the battery last a long time with the engine off and radio running?

 

[jjdurrant]

Congrats on your purchase. As far as your skeg, this is what I did with mine on my Sea Ray. Its called a skeg Guard.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Skeg-Guard-Skeggard-Inboard-Outboard-Boat-Marine-/321482687607?pt=Boat_Parts_Accessories_Gear&hash=item4ad9dc8477&vxp=mtr

Its easy to do, and it holds up very well. Also get a stainless prop. I suppose you have an Alpha one drive on that Merc. I had a 21" Vengance prop on mine. Its a great all around prop. Also, looking at your pictures, you need to check your sacrificial anodes. You can replace them fairly cheap. Good luck!

Yep, Alpha one drive. I only run the boat in freshwater.. anodes still needed? Next prop will be stainless and I'll pick up the guard after repair.

 

[JC6275]

If you are boating where you have a good chance of hitting stuff with the prop I would not go with stainless, if you hit with a stainless prop you will most likely do catastrophic damage to the lower unit instead of letting the prop take the damage. Check the gauge connections behind the dash for loose wires, you should install a power cutoff switch to completely kill the power if it doesn't already have one. I would think the oil pressure should be between 40 and 60 lbs

 

[JC6275]

If you want to flush the motor after use or to work on it and you need it running, you will need a set of lower unit "ear muffs" to put on with with the waterhose fitting

 

[jjdurrant]

Ok got it

 

[sysinu]

Nice clean looking boat!

Couple points judging from your pictures .

Have your prop fixed, those dings ruin your holeshot. My dad has that same boat and he had his prop fixed (it was about the same shape as yours) and it increased his top end by 4MPH and time to plane came down by almost a second. Call around and use your local bayliner dealer as a last resort for fixing your prop. There is a guy out by where I live called the "Prop Doc" and he's awesome... charges 50-75$ for aluminum props is all.


Second, look at getting an after market swim platform extension put on. You'll probably want to do that over the winter or right before next season, but that was a HUGE thin for me on my Cobalt. As far as I/O's go they really don't give you much in the way of comfort when re-boarding your boat. Bayliner is no exception to that. You'll find that it will be the best 800$ you've ever spent on your boat. Have a look at the Euro platform (http://www.swim-platform.com/euro.html) and the one/two step (http://www.swim-platform.com/onetwo-step.html) from swim platform. Obviously the one/two step is going to be less money. I would HIGHLY urge you to get something though, otherwise someone's knee is going to get opened by that prop if you use it for anything other than getting around (like water sports).

I put something like the euro platform on my Cobalt and it increased my resale value by a TON as well. When I sold my Cobalt, I had 1 person who hadn't seen the picture of the swim platform and another person who had .. both were interested and the swim platform caused a bidding war between the two of the buyers. They are not hard to put on if you have 2 people and some wood to brace the platform up... so if you're handy, don't have someone put it on for you (it will be expensive).

 

[jjdurrant]

Thanks! I really like the swim platform! When we were out yesterday I made sure the kids jumped off the side and not the back

I was quote about $150 for the Skeg repair which seems reasonable. Once that is done I will add a guard.

For the prop, I am still learning and am trying to research the advantages and disadvantges of a stainless.

 

[sysinu]

. Stick to aluminum w/ this boat. Trust me! When you master the art of boat handling and have a couple years of boating experience behind you (and probably 5-6 prop dings as well), then you can think about spending 8-10x as much on a SS prop as you would otherwise.

 

[RiverRat]

X2 on the aluminum props, especially if you have/get the Exchangeable Hub System, in which case brand new props can be had for about 120 bucks. My '06 Bayliner 175 with the 3.0 came with it. Coincidentally I'm currently trying to unload it, and had I known you might have been into an I/O, I'd have met you at least half way up there by you, if not closer, since my weekend boating destination is La Crosse, WI.

 

[jjdurrant]

Argh.. yeah @RiverRat.. wish I would have known sooner! Pics and what are you asking?

 

[RiverRat]

http://milwaukee.craigslist.org/boa/4608100220.html

 

[jjdurrant]

MAN!!! Where were you last week??? I would have bought it for sure