Hey guys after lurking and looking at all the sweet mods you guys have done I decided to get in on this. So I bought me a boat the other day and am looking forward to making it mine. It is a 1981 Lowe 1436 flat bottom that I picked up for $500 bucks. Both the trailer and boat are in decent shape structurally and not so good cosmetically lol. (I will try to get pics up tomorrow) So as I looked over the boat I dubbed it with the name Swamp Donkey. The boat is however mostly welded, especially around the rotten transom. so I was wondering, should I replace the transom before or after I begin the process of painting the outside of the boat? and If I were to replace it how would you guys go about cutting the welds on the corner braces? cutoff wheel? angle grinder? I know that I need to show you guys pics and Ill be sure to get them up soon! thanks in advance and I look forward to joining this community!

Thanks for joining!

Get those pictures up so the guys can at least point you in the right direction.

Love the name...

Alright so here are the pictures...




Here you can see what shape the transom is in and some of the welds around the corners...






Something kinda cool, look closely at the bolt, when you remove it there is surprise...


It extends the trailer, kinda thinkin I should get that closed up...

I'd pull it out then do what you need to the bost and then put in a new transom.

You got a nice rig there, good luck with it!!!

I like the extending tongue great for launching at shallow ramps. I would replace the bolt with a lockable pin.

I would get all of the transom work done before you paint. I'd hate to get the paint done and then realize I had to drill or weld the boat and mess up the paint.

Nice find! My trailer is similar. Please look at what I did with my trailer and it might help you. I really did not care for those hubs so it was a cheap easy change. Click on link. viewtopic.php?f=21&t=14366

Thanks for the encouragement guys! Well I pulled the boat off the trailer to get a better look at the trailer and decided to work on it first. I began stripping her down to bare bones and began taking off the old paint/rust from the trailer itself. Howard- should have read your thread earlier, I was using a wire wheel for hours trying to get that junk off and finally called it quits about halfway through... I will be picking up a sanding wheel tomorrow... Will post pictures tomorrow

the quickest thing i found for rust was a wire brush drill attachment. im sure someone has something that works better but that's how i did it. definately quicker than just a wire brush

Those sanding wheels work awesome, down side is you can go through several of them but man they get down to bare metal quick. Also the homecenters have a wheel thats blue and looks like melted plastic but it also works good and will last longer. You can get a angle grinder for 30 - 40 bucks now,

angle grinder with sanding wheel is definately the way to go. I am going to through the same exact process as you. I have my trailer 1/2 sanded and all taken apart. I was afraid to sand without priming immediately so I am doing it in pieces. Self etching primer isnt the cheapest. The grinder made my steel look like it came from the factory. Good luck

So today was great, I decided after leaving the trailer outside last night and seeing the newly formed rust on the places i had just grinded I decided to start doing it in pieces. so I took off the tongue of the trailer and began on it today. I took your advise Howard and used one of those sanding wheels on the angle grinder. If you need to take paint and rust off easily that is the way to go. I had to run to the home depot this afternoon and picked up some more of those sanding wheels, primer/paint, and some rust converter. I got the outside of the tongue looking pretty good then decided to primer it. Next I took the inside piece on the tongue that has the coupler and used rust converter on it (rust reformer). This stuff is amazing, one coat and it looks great, Im so glad nobody before me decided to paint that thing because I would have had to grind it down. One more coat and it will be ready to be painted.

After removing the tounge


After taking off the safety chain thing and grinding for about 20 minutes, Notice what kind of wheel is on the angle grinder.




Ground down to nothing


The two pieces


After primer- the white is the outside the black is the inside of the tongue




the black is the rust reformer made by rustoleum i think, it worked awesome, and the white is rustoleum primer.


Well that be all for today, tomorrow is supposed to be in the 100's so im gonna try to get done working early and maybe get a little more done on the trailer. Thanks for the support!!!

I have been trying to decide how to run the lights to my trailer. As I looked at the old photos I saw how the conduit had been welded to the top of the tongue because of its special telescoping powers. Anyways I thought it looked ugly as sin the first time I saw it so I was trying to figure out a way to work around this tongue issue without something ugly to get in the way. Then it hit me! Could I also tack on a new piece of conduit, but this time run it under the tongue? That way if I thought I needed to make it longer I just unhook the lights and back the boat in that way? I mean Ill probably tow it in the shortest position so why not make that the longest the light wires need to run to the front? Anybody ever done this? Or thought of it? Am I not making sense? Maybe you could shed some light on my ideas and give your perspective. Heck, if you got a better idea Id love to hear it!

Mine also telescopes but I will never use it so I wired it as it sits. I only have one boat so no worries unless you have 2 or loan it out. Try those blue wheels, good for paint removel. Are you changing your hubs?

You need to get one of those wire wheel brushes attachments for tha much rust. Takes it off real fast and doesnt ever run out.

Howard- Yes I have thought about doing that same thing but many of our "ramps" around here are just where the dirt meets water around the river. I will probably be using the extension quite a bit and I think if I just get that conduit tacked on underneath it would kinda hide. that way I can just unhook the lights, extend the tongue and drop her in the water. because ill probably tow it the same every time, and sure if somebody really needed to borrow it (but none of my friends own a boat lol Im only 18) that would be okay, we would just have to work something out to extend the lights via a connector or something. oh and the hubs, i really havent thought about it, when I went to look at the boat the guy couldn't get one of the tires to air up, so I took the flat one with me and started to drive home, well on my way home I stopped by the walmart at 11PM and found a tire/wheel combo aired up and ready to go $38 so after the purchase I called the guy and told him I was on my way with a new tire. The way I figured, I would have spend prolly $70 or $80 in gas going home that night and coming back the next day with the tire aired up, so all in all I got a spare tire for cheap. So I towed the thing home and ended up getting back about 1:30 AM. I was on the interstate at one point and towed the thing at 70 for about 30 minutes, plus the rest of the way home on the highway/ county roads. That night they passed the test in my book, only thing I would change up for would be extra clearance but not a huge issue for me. And this blue wheel you speak of is it those sandpaper looking ones or something else?

Trout-I was using a wire wheel at first and spent forever just to make it look kinda good and I might consider myself a perfectionist but if im gonna do a job i wanna do it right and get it done ya know. I dont wanna knock your way of doing things, im just saying it wasn't workin for me.

Whatever floats your boat

You should at least take the hubs apart and check the bearings. I towed my trailer on the highway with no problems the day I got it, but when I took apart the hubs the bearings and spindles were shot. Better to find out now than ruin a day of fishing in the future!

This is the wheel I used. Worked very well with paint and good with rust. If your hubs are like my old ones, they did not have stubs on them for the lug nuts. I had to run a bolt through the wheel into the hub and then the bolt would extend out the other side of the hub. Just didn't like that set up. New hub ( with studs and lug nuts ) came prepacked and new bearings inside for $30 at Northern Tool.

Caster- Im glad you pointed that out! That would have never occurred to me. But yes I will take a look at them, I need to take the frame of the trailer apart soon anyways so I can get it prepped for primer/paint.

Howard-It looks like that would do wonders on paint/rust. Can I ask where you picked that thing up at?

Today was extremely so not alot got done. However I did talk a friend of mine into welding for me. He attached the new safety chains to the inner tongue, tacked on the new conduit under the outer tongue and even began making me a winch post.

last coat of Rust Reformer








Conduit got a little hot


Weld is not beautiful, but will definitely hold.

Got the wheel at Home Depot. Always good to have a friend that welds and love those boots! Like that you welded the coupler on and links to hold safety chains. Looking good in Ks.

Spent most of the day working, so coming home to the trailer tongue still uncompleted was kind of a downer, but I got out the angle grinder and got started. Began by cutting, grinding and rounding all the sharp edges on the winch post and prepared the bow stop arms for painting. Then stopped by the local hardware store and picked up bolts to hold up the arms and some U bolts to attach it to the trailer. I also picked up some JB weld stick, Im not sure if it was a good idea or not but I did locate a few small holes towards the rear of the boat... But nothing major really, the largest one couldn't have been more than a 1/16" big so a little JB putty cant hurt too bad. It says that it is sand-able and paint-able so not too worried in that department. All of the tongue is primered and will probably be ready for paint tomorrow or later this weekend. I will attempt to get my bunks fabricated, cut, drilled, and sealed with Thompson's so that they will be ready for carpet and maybe even mounting if I get the trailer frame grinded and painted. Oh and Howard, thanks for the kind words bud!