Sometime in April I was so happy to find this site, one expressly for Aquasports. For years and as long as we had the 87 222 Osprey, I had taken the boat for granted, just using it and not thinking of how great a boat it really was. This past May I repowered with a new OptiMax and the season has been stellar so far. The engine runs as advertised. Starts right up, no choking or starting rituals, just squeeze the primer 3-4 times, turn the key and she fires and runs.
I had wired up a new switchpanel and re-did all the connections to all the lights and bilge pump and everything has been working like it should, not like things were the past 4-5 years or so when I had everything jury-rigged with alligator clips everywhere to clip right to the battery to get simple things like NAV lights or Anchor lights to run, or the bilge.
I'm still loving how shallow I can get this boat as it has been said, "If you are not grounding out or banging on underwater boulders, you aren't fishing in the right place." And the best thing is when I pull the boat up on the trailer, there isn't even a scratch on the bottom.
So all in all, for a 19 year old boat that has been in the water for at least 4 months out of every year, she is still doing just fine.
