Resurrecting a 1652 MonArk

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lbursell

Well-known member
Joined
Aug 18, 2010
Messages
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Location
Bonham, Texas
All right, gentlemen,

I guess it’s finally time for me to step up to the plate. What we have here is a long neglected 1982 model 1652 MonArk with a 25 horse motor by Evinrude, also 1982 model. The boat has been sitting beneath an RV carport for at least 8 years. Right off the bat, here, before anything else – Thanks to Jim for creating a fantastic site for ordinary fishermen and boaters to share knowledge and experiences in an enjoyable, supportive environment. This is the only forum I’ve ever joined or even been interested in joining. I’ve been hovering and lurking here, with the occasional posted comment since last summer, when I stumbled across a couple of YouTube postings with links to TinBoats. I’ve been feeding my TinBoat addiction with almost daily injections of cruising the threads, getting ideas and inspiration from the builds found here to apply to my own soon-to-be dream boat/fishing machine. Fair warning – I am completely new to this boat remodeling craft so I will unashamedly beg, borrow and definitely steal ideas and techniques from here to use in my own build. Plans at the moment include using vinyl decking boards, instead of wood, for trailer bunks; using HydroTurf mats, instead of carpet, for all of my horizontal deck surfaces and trying out one of Water Snake brand trolling motors from Australia. I have some ideas that may be a little off the wall (I prefer “out of the box”) about how to proceed with parts of my build, so I will welcome any and all comments, questions, encouragement or criticism that will help me in getting a better boat out of the process.

So, here’s the boat. We bought it back in the late 1990’s primarily for fishing in the back bays around Corpus Christi and Port Aransas, with the very occasional trip into fresh water. We moved to North Texas in 2000. Somehow, going fishing took a back burner position to other priorities and the boat became the location to stack scrap lumber and other materials left over from various projects around the house. Looking back, it seems like there were a LOT of projects back then, so there is a lot of just plain, ol’ junk to get out of the way.

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How long does something have to sit to sink this deep into the soil?
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A couple of pics of the “VIN” plate just to show how much there is to work with here.
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All of the junk is out and either hauled off or stashed elsewhere. I have to admit (while hanging my head :oops: ), this was a great opportunity to get rid of an eyesore that had grown in the back yard. Pic from the front of the boat.
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Middle bench towards the stern. Gotta love the green astroturf-colored carpet. I don’t think they made outdoor carpet in any other color back then.
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And the back.
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From the stern towards the bow.
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I hope “is on the rise again” applies to the boat.
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The floor between the benches.
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The front deck.
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The previous owner had put actual carpet padding beneath the green stuff on the front deck. It was easy on feet and kept that big aluminum sheet from sounding like a big kettle drum when you dropped something on it. I’m not intending to go that route.
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Weapons of choice for removing carpet and glue. The carpet padding took very little effort to get up.
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And the green carpet came off like peeling an orange. Just a few quick tugs and it peeled right up.
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The carpet glue, however, was another story entirely. It had bonded to the aluminum extremely well (can’t be mad, ‘cause that is what it’s supposed to do) and was a bugger to get up.
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In the end, there were three different types of glue applied to the boat. The white stuff came away fairly easily. The two types of darker, gray stuff felt at times like I was chipping away at marble. I don’t know if the PO did it in three different projects, or, if he would have been like me, and just worked with what he had around the house at the time.
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Anyway, getting out the carpet and the majority of the carpet glue took the better part of a week, working one or two hours a day. I decided to refurbish the trailer before getting too deep into the boat, so digging out the trailer became the next step.
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Almost like an archeological dig. Somewhere, Indiana Jones is hanging from a winch and cable over a snake pit. I did kill two copperheads that I disturbed during this phase of operations. Pretty snakes, but I didn’t want them that close to the house.
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Front end up and out.
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Is the back end sunk that deep or is the tire flat? Both.
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Step 1: Jack up the trailer and boat on both sides.
Step 2: Place cinder blocks, spare tires or whatever works for you beneath the boat with landscape timbers laid across to support the boat.
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Step 3: Lower the trailer, leaving the boat supported in mid-air. I was not happy with the single landscaping timber, so I repeated the entire process and doubled up on the landscape timbers.
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Rotate the trailer guide-ons back and then down so they can clear the landscape timbers when the trailer is pulled out.
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The rear of the boat is supported on two sides with cinderblocks and landscape timbers and at the stern with more cinderblocks. The guide-ons were released and allowed to drag behind the trailer until it was clear. I’m replacing the lights, anyway.
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The front end of the boat is suspended from the roof of the RV shed. Move a few bricks out of the way and the trailer is ready to pull out.
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I guess I forgot to take pictures of the trailer while it was pulled out. This pic just shows how little room there is to spare once I got it into the garage. But, there will be plenty of trailer pictures in the next upload which will consist mostly of the trailer tear down and preparation for paint. Also, there will be blood.

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YOUS HAVE A BOAT THAT HAS LOT OF POTENTIAL RITE THERE.IF I WAS YOU I WOOD REMOVE THE MITTLE SEAT BENCH SO YOUS CAN HAVE OPEN DEZINE AND THEN YOUS CAN ADD LENGHT TO FRON T DECK.YOUS CAN ALLSO ADD ALIMIMUM FLOORING AN PAINT OF NON SLIP COATINGS.I WATCH AS YOUS MAKE PROGRESS ON HER.OPEN DEZINE IS LIKE WHAY I HAS ON ME TIN BOAT,OPEN DEZINE MAKE OTHERS THINK YOUS HAS BIGGER BOAT THAN WHAT YOUS ACTUALY HAS WITCH IS GOODD =D>
 
Great to see you bringing this one back to life.

Not many that have to be unearthed to start. :lol:
 
That looks like a carbon copy of my Alumacraft 1648 (although yours must be a little wider). My middle seat has a live well that I use for storage. I put hatches on either side of the live well for extra storage. You could use your center seat for storage too. I was afraid to remove mine because it's structural support.

Awesome looking boat. It will be a flats/bay fishing machine.
 
Thanks guys. One of the challenges I've put in front of myself on this is to keep the benches and foam intact. Call me paranoid, but I want to know the flotation factor is there if it is ever needed. Even then, I plan to add more foam beneath the flooring. The good thing about a boat of this size is that the roominess allows flexibility. Right now, my intention is to deck over between the middle bench and the front deck to provide storage and space for a bait well, with a live well just behind the middle bench. Back when I was using the boat in the bays, it had no trouble planing with me and two other guys, equipment and ice chests, so I'm pretty sure it can handle the weight of a live well, especially if I pay attention to weight distribution.
 
I did remove all the foam from one side and some from the other in my middle seat. There was a block on either side of the live well. I plan to put foam under the floor when replace it and have a foam block in the front when I redo the front deck. That middle seat is a ton of storage space.

I may even try to insulate the livewell to make a fish box. I usually use a flowtroll bucket if I fish live bait.
 
That's a great boat !!Took me two weeks to get all the carpet glue out of mine with a wire wheel.Glad that I did it though.Have fun,I am with mine.I'm thinking of cutting my center bench and making it a walk through.Then closeing off the ends a foot on each side and filling them up with new foam.
 
Looks like you got a good start going there. Love to see a tin that's resurrected.

If you are still having carpet glue removal issues, check out my build. There's some information there on carpet glue removal that'll save you a lot of labor.

Have fun. :D
 
OK – The trailer is in the garage and its time to start the tear-down process. This is a 1982 Highlander trailer made in Fort Worth, Texas by Fuqua Industries. Apparently, they’re not in business anymore, so now you know as much about the trailer as I do. I didn’t get a full length picture of the entire trailer, but we’ll start at the front and work our way back to give an idea of what we’re working with.

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You can see that rust is starting to get a good hold on pretty much everything. That’s why I decided to go ahead with an entire trailer re-build and paint.

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A new winch and new trailer jack are on order from Great Lakes Skipper.

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Everything made from wood will be replaced with the vinyl decking material. I’ve got a couple of ideas about how to counter the flexibility and reinforce it for strength and rigidity. I’ll be the guinea pig for everyone else and see if it can be made to work.

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The roller brackets are going away and not coming back.

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The guide-ons worked flawlessly before and there’s no reason not go ahead and re-use them. They will also get a fresh coat of paint just to freshen up the look.

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This is what a bunk bracket looks like after several years of being dunked in and out of salt water. All of the bunk brackets and associated hardware will be replaced.

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Putting that shiny new hitch latch up there was like just getting a taste of what could be done here.

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Winch and jack coming off.

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Dropping the tongue out of the frame.

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Thanks to lckstckn2smknbrrls for the advice on the white lithium grease. I had no idea what it was.

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Years of salt water immersion did a real number on the nuts and bolts. There were three ways of getting them off. #1 – Holding with a vise wrench on one side and a box end wrench on the other and unscrewing them apart in the normal way. That worked for about twenty percent of them. The other eighty percent split about evenly between:

#2 – The bolt just sheared off and
#3 – Getting out the dremel tool with a cutting head and cutting as deep as I could into the nut. Then, I’d take a hammer and cold chisel and split the nut the rest of the way. Technique #2 was by far the easiest of the three.

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Trailer completely disassembled and all hardware off.

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I originally wanted to try to save the fender decals, but decided later that if I wanted them back, it would be easier, and probably better looking, to just get replacement decals. Even though it’s a galvanized trailer, you can see where the rust is getting a foothold below the decals. Another reason to go ahead and paint.

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The entire trailer frame is disassembled and put out of the way on sawhorses.

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I couldn’t justify to myself buying all new hardware and brackets when everything was already there. Pretty much everything, except nuts and bolts, was just as strong as when it was first mounted. It was just all ugly with rust.

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So, I got a wire wheel and a wire cup brush and put them in the drill press. A little bit of grinding and elbow grease and you can see the difference.

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Halfway done with this piece.

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This piece is done. The difference is obvious.

The rusty bunk brackets, however, were completely unusable. Just so happens that I bought a used boat trailer a few years ago to turn into a lawn mower trailer. When I took the bunks off of that trailer, I saved the bunk brackets and other hardware, thinking they might come in handy someday. They had been covered in black paint, so they were definitely if good shape. Just needed to go back to the drill press and the wire wheel for a little paint and rust removal.

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The bracket on the right came off of the Highlander trailer the boat has been sitting on. The bracket in the middle came from the converted trailer. The one on the left is freshly scraped and ready for primer.

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I can’t do a project without putting a little blood into it. After this, I wore leather gloves for the rest of the grinding.

Next up is wheel bearing replacement and lots of painting.

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OK, back after a short hiatus - Holidays, family upkeep, etc. A lot of these pics were made back around Thanksgiving and I'm just getting caught up on the postings. Replaced the bearings and got started painting on the trailer hardware.

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This is what the wheels looked like at the beginning.
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Lots of grinding with the wire wheel in the drill, along with patience, patience, patience....
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Gave them a short bath in vinegar to provide a very light etch before applying primer.
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Even the primer looks good! (IMHO)
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But the painted white looks even better.

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Now, back to all that trailer hardware that needs to be painted. All the grinding has been done and now its time for a little primer.

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Farm Implement Paint in Ford Blue from Tractor Supply. To quote Richard Pryor: "That's a PRETTY blue." :D

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Next up - Painting the actual trailer frame. That was a weekend adventure all by itself.
 
This is really an amazing build. I only have one request...can you post a few pictures please? :LOL2:

Seriously....love the pics. Makes me feel like I'm right there with you. Keep it up!
 
Thanks, guys. I never really thought about just how much intricate detail there is to a trailer until I broke it down to all the various parts. I knew when I started that this project would take at least a year. Now, I'm realizing that I'm gonna have to re-vise the estimate. I just work really slow and, as the saying goes, "The devil is, indeed, in the details." But, I am having a therapeutic blast.
 
WOW talk about gettin to work Awesome job keep those pics coming! I think alll new vehicle production should be shut down for 5 years so everyone can rebuild save and use what we have!! no need for this throw away system
 

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