# Riveted Jon Boat with Jet??



## trpastor (Aug 6, 2011)

Hey guys

I'm really new to boats in general. I am a river rat. love wading and catchin smallies. But I am running out of space to fish that is wade able and accessible and good. 

I have a small jon with a 9.9Merc (14x36 I think). I get stuck pretty easily on the rivers I like to fish. So I was thinking about putting a small jet on it. Could i seal the rivets somehow so I can run on shallow water? Or can I just run it with the rivets and a seal them as needed. Or will I risk OUTRIGHT popping one off and getting a leak that will put me in peril? 

I appreciate any advice on how to make this happen, where to find a good jet used, etc. 

Thanks guys!


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## Ranchero50 (Aug 6, 2011)

Peril is relative  I run slow over the nasties, would rather bump a rock and smack one. Plastic worms will save the day though when you rip the transom loose.

Personally I use the jet to run up to the real nasty stuff, then just idle over and through the boulders and ridges. I'm using riveted .063" thin hull so cautious is the keyword. My water is boulders and razerback ridges, not gravel or mud shoals. My hull drafts 4-5", planes 2-3" so 2" of extra clearance at speed doesn't mean much to me vs. the consequences of nailling a big rock.

So build it light with a balanced load and take it easy and you should be ok.
Jamie


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## ramuh2121 (Jul 29, 2013)

I'm running an 18' riveted Lowe with a 40/30 hanging off the back on a manual jack plate. However, I try to avoid any water lower than a foot. I am very new to the game, but love the worryfreeness of a jet over a prop. So far the only issue I've had is it only has a single riveted knee brace and the front two rivents on the bottom started to pull out from the additional weight on the back. Drilled those out and replaced with SS bolts and washers sealed with 3M marine sealant and it's dryer than it has ever been. Mine is not a gem by any means, so I will continue to fix things as they come break. BTW, I never leave home without my bilge pump and considered carrying a spare after the knee brace started to come up. That let water in pretty quickly, especially when running.


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## PSG-1 (Jul 29, 2013)

[url=https://www.tinboats.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=218019#p218019 said:


> Ranchero50 » 06 Aug 2011, 20:40[/url]"]Peril is relative  I run slow over the nasties, would rather bump a rock and smack one. Plastic worms will save the day though when you rip the transom loose.
> 
> Personally I use the jet to run up to the real nasty stuff, then just idle over and through the boulders and ridges. I'm using riveted .063" thin hull so cautious is the keyword. My water is boulders and razerback ridges, not gravel or mud shoals. My hull drafts 4-5", planes 2-3" so 2" of extra clearance at speed doesn't mean much to me vs. the consequences of nailling a big rock.
> 
> ...





I was wondering about operating boats without UHMW around rocks, how do people manage to do it without tearing holes in their boats on a regular basis? (you have to remember, I'm from the land of oyster beds and mud flats, and the occasional log or sandbar, rocks in the river is a foreign concept to me) One of these days, I have a few rivers in SC I'd like to go check out, but the rocks concern me. Although my hull is .090", that's still not enough to stop a rock from punching. 

As for plastic worms to plug holes, gashes, etc....good idea. The one time I put a hole in my jetboat (hit the end of a partially submerged 2 inch steel pipe) I jammed it with some rags, and the bilge pump with float switch was able to keep up with the leak until I got back to shore. Turns out when I skimmed over the pipe, it caught right at the very back end of the boat where the transom meets the bottom of the hull, so, it actually peeled the weld apart, and also bent the drain plug tube. In addition, as the boat skimmed over the pipe, it caught the steering nozzle bracket and busted that loose, so, I had no steering going back to port, I had to steer the boat by letting it idle while I stood in the bow and used the paddle like a forward rudder.

Now you know why I'm apprehensive about rocks. :shock:


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## Ranchero50 (Jul 29, 2013)

Throw an old metal trashcan at a big tree is about the right sound for when you hit. Usually when the jet hit's it's just a bog BOOM, and the motor over revs when it flies out of the water.

I'll try to get some video as the river levels drop. Usually it's the OB jet guys that whack'em hardest. The prop guys with forks just slowly plow over the nasties.

Usually in late summer most of the bad rocks are painted bright aluminum.


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## PSG-1 (Jul 30, 2013)

[url=https://www.tinboats.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=324139#p324139 said:


> Ranchero50 » Yesterday, 17:11[/url]"]Throw an old metal trashcan at a big tree is about the right sound for when you hit. Usually when the jet hit's it's just a bog BOOM, and the motor over revs when it flies out of the water.
> 
> I'll try to get some video as the river levels drop. Usually it's the OB jet guys that whack'em hardest. The prop guys with forks just slowly plow over the nasties.
> 
> Usually in late summer most of the bad rocks are painted bright aluminum.




Every bit of that is un-nerving to me! I think if I hit a rock, there'd be another sound...nuggets dropping in the floor of the boat LOL. 

Like I said, I've grown up running boats along the coast, and in coastal floodplain rivers, nothing above the eastern seaboard fall line, so, the only rocks I'm used to seeing are the ones on the jetties at the mouth of an inlet. Gliding over a sandbar or an oyster bed is one thing, but going over rocks, especially large ones that are submerged is another story. 

Gauging depth of sandbars is simple, you look for wakes or ripples breaking, and if you don't see them, it's a safe bet you can cross it. But how do you judge underwater rocks? And how can you determine the difference between a current boil, or an underwater rock causing a disturbance at the surface? I reckon if you've operated in those types of rivers enough, you learn how to do it, kinda like the way we're able to judge where submerged oyster reefs are located down here on the coast.


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## Ranchero50 (Jul 31, 2013)

You really need to know your stretch of water to determine what and where you can run. Late summer can be treacherous as the flows go down, I use the amount of exposed ram as a gauge. Where I run there is a shallow dam for the power station so the basin is about 4' deep. Some years we'll get huge grass growth and it'll back the water up over the ridges so you can run safer. Last year the grass didn't grow and the Indian fish traps were coming out of the water below the ridges. I walked the river just to get to know where the rock lines were. The Indians planted boulders about 15' apart on top of the wall, some of them were granite so you could see them easily. In one of my videos my oldest son is standing on one while I goofed off around him. 

One of the worst things is when the flow goes too low and you don't get ripples. A stretch of water near Shepherdstown WV is fun, 20' deep off the end of the ramp but 100 feet upstream it's inches where some hug boulders are right below the surface. A half mile up river there are exposed limestone razerbacks. Lots of paddlers in that water so you have to be careful where you run. Google Harpers Ferry of Brunswick and check out that stretch of river. Sadly the Google folks take their picks in the winter when the water is up.

The Susquehanna has a granite bottom and aluminum sticks to granite.


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## PSG-1 (Jul 31, 2013)

We have indian fish traps on the Great Pee Dee river, between Blewitt Falls Dam and Cheraw, SC. Basically, lines of zig-zagging rocks that go all the way across the river, really visible on google earth. 

Google is useful for scouting out areas of rivers, and the pictures people post to google/panoramio are helpful to a degree. The only issue is that there's no way to go back in date on the hydrographs and guages to see what the reading was at the date the sat image, or photo, was taken, so, it's hard to interpolate the data, without actually having been on those rivers at various stages of flow.

I would guess the potential for danger running upstream would be that going against the current, it causes the transom to squat lower in the water, requiring more draft. Running downstream, my biggest fear would be hitting the upstream side of a rock, then turning sideways and broaching. Both those scenarios are why I have thus far kept off rivers above the fall line. One of these days, I'm going to gather up the nerve to try it.


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## lowe1648 (Jul 31, 2013)

If that's what you have of can afford right now run it. It's cheaper to make mistakes starting out with a jet in a cheap lite boat. I ran a rivited hull for 3 years before I bought a welded .100 hull. Even going to a .100 hull you will still have issues if your hitting rocks. I've been lucky with only a few dents and a couple cracked welds. The thinner the aluminum the lighter the boat needs to be to survive a impact.


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## scubapro820 (Jul 31, 2013)

I dropped my boat off my trailer on a steep ramp onto the ramp pad............ so I pushed the boat in the water with my trailer no problems lol


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## PSG-1 (Aug 1, 2013)

I agree with Lowe 1648, if it's what you have, run with it. The only thing I would advise would be to make sure to reinforce the area of the engine and pump as much as possible, due to the thinner hull.


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