North Carolina River Fishing and Canoeing with Mack: Maiden Voyage of My Sears 12 ' Jon Boat

I moved in my house in 1993. Bernie, my next door neighbor had a jon boat in his back yard that after a few years you could tell he was never gonna use it. So, one day I ask him if he will sell it. No!.....I wait a few more years.....No! I am not gonna sell it he says. This went on for years. It got to be amusing that I would ask him to sell it just to irritate him. His wife(Doris) also told me that the day he dies that the first thing she is gonna do is to call me and have me drag it out of her yard.
Well, one day this year he asks me if I want it?

I say "is this a trick question".

He said no, I want it out of my yard. I think what he meant to say is Doris wants it out of her yard. Anyway, I ask him how much? and he says free. I paid him a little bit as I didn't want it free but here are a few pictures of my new to me jon before and after. Rotted wood on both sides.

She wasn't in too bad of shape but all the wood in the transom was bad and she needed new paint.
I replaced the transom wood on the inside with poplar that I epoxy sealed and painted, and the wood on the out side of the transom I replaced with plastic and and outer piece of 3/16 aluminum. The plastic was a cutting board that I cut to fit. The outside of the boat I painted Huntergreen and the inside was a matte green.
This is a view of the cutting board and aluminum I used for the transom.

Per NC regulations this boat has to have a serial number which it didn't. They assigned it one and I had to attach it to the transom. I kept thinking how was I gonna do that and one day it hit me.! Go to PetSmart and have the serial number engraved on a dog tag and put that on the back. Brilliant! If you look closely above the right handle you can see the black tag.

I also needed a way to move this boat from my backyard to frontyard easily so I came up with this contraption. It is a piece of wood. 2- L brackets. 2 sheets of rubber. 2 eyebolts, 1 wheel, 1 nut and bolt, and 1 strap. I can strap this down in about 30 seconds and grab the 2 back handles and move the boat around like a wheelbarrow.

No leaks except for a small one where the drain plug is. Hopefully a new drain plug will fix that.

Very soon I will test it out with my old Sears Gamefisher 7 HP motor. update to follow. Thanks Mack

ADDED: JULY 2013

Finally took the Jon out with my 2.5 mercury motor. The Sears 7 hp is in the shop. Here is a video of the 2.5 crusin Jordan Lake.

http://www.youtube.com/edit?ns=1&video_id=OfpIYl9dBug

ADDED NOVEMBER 2013

Finally took the Jon out in September with the Sears 7 HP motor, Watch her FLY!!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXzNgGnDD94

ADDED: AUGUST 2013

Added 4 "Santee" Rodholders to my little Jon. These are just like Driftmasters.

Added February 2014-

I added a back seat to my little jon. This seat I purchased at walmart and it attaches to the Jon by a strip of aluminum J-channel on the Jon and a J channel plate on the bottom of the seat (with added swivel). This allows the seat to be removed or added easily by "dropping it into the channel. The seat can be adjusted either left , right, or center depending on conditions. Here are a few pics

This is how you "drop" the seat in.