Here's some pics of the bracket I made last winter.
Sorry I don't have more pics. I just didn't think of taking any of the process.
I built a mold, layed up the bracket with heavy roving and 3/4 oz glass, vinylester resin, marine ply for the "stern" and marine ply for stringers. Really not all that hard, just itchy, smelly, and messy!
I was just talking to a fella about why people put brackets on ole Hydra-sports the other day.
He's selling a 1989 25 CC all original with two 200 Yamaha HPDI's on the back that are a few years old and 700 hrs and a nice trailer for 22K!
NO BRACKET.
"The boat that started it all", I said to him. "the SKA and the kingfish tournament craze...."
Which he has always fished, but probably didn't even realize that aspect of his 25'.
I'm pretty sure that the 2500 Vector also came with a bracket from the factory if you wanted it that way. I've seen several rigged with the old twin 200's on an aluminum bracket. It wasn't a flotation bracket though and the water line is quite a bit higher at the stern on those boats. That's one reason why I built my own.
I did a bunch of calculations on the buoyancy I thought I'd need and I hit it right on the nose. The water line didn't move at all with the motors sitting back 28 inches and an extra 300 lbs on the stern. The boat had been rigged with a 300HP 8 cyl Johnson. I like the extra room in the cockpit, swim platform, and the boat runs flatter without tabs. Top speed stayed the same (40 mph) with 20 less horses and the boat runs much better in a big sea. I think that is more due to having two props in the water instead of one though.
To buy a fiberglass bracket is close to $5000.00 I've got about $1500.00 in this one and if I were to pay myself about $3 per hour for the work I put into it I'm sure I'm still well under 5K!. Seriously though I bet I could build the next one in half the time. More important though is it was a lot of fun to build. I'd done lots of fiberglass repair and rebuilding over the years but had never built anything in a mold. So I just had to give it a go.
Last edited by Capt. Fred; 11-14-2007 at 09:12 PM.
Do you think you could use closed cell foam block to make the mould and then leave it in place? Also did you seal it up as an airchamber or did you fill it with foam? You mentioned getting the bouyancy correct how did you derive the amount you needed?
Bracket Pictures
Linear Mode
