LiFePO4 – It’s a chemical Equation – Lithium Iron Phosphate

The new LiTime batteries has caused a lot of consternation

After watching a lot of YouTube videos the past year or so about Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries (LiFePO4) I was thinking about making the switch.

Then about a month ago one of my favorite Youtubers, who has The Engineered Angler channel did a two-part series on his decision to make the switch from Lead/Acid batteries to LiFePO4. Franco did a great job of convincing me that I too should make the switch. Afterall, the two lead acid batteries I had hooked up in series to create a 24 volt system to run my Minn Kota Terrova trolling motor were not holding their charge very well. I bought a load testing device and it proved what I already knew. That being that it was time for me to use them to save the core charge when I would purchase the LiFEPO4 batteries Franco had switched to.

I think Franco got his on the cheap or perhaps free from a company that was once named Ampere but is now LiTime (that’s short for Lithium Time and not Lee Time as many are calling it on YouTube). Franco did some great tests and gave his new batteries a rave review. 

So I bought two of them as well on the 4th of July. 

That’s when this mini adventure that has taken 26 days to get correct started. Yes, 26 days. I am writing this story as an educational review to make you aware of how this switch should take place.

It took about 10 days to get the batteries. Of course when they arrived it was like Christmas for me. At least it was in terms of my excitement. I don’t normally buy myself Christmas presents and if I did I would not spend $700+ dollars.

Yes, $700+ but that includes a 29.2 volt battery charger for Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries from LiTime. From here on out I will just call them Lithium batteries and chargers. 

The batteries arrived both showing a SOC (State of Charge) of 13.2 volts. According to the chart in the owner’s manual a 13.2 charge is equivalent to a 75% charge in them. Check the chart below to see how it all looks.

SOC (%) Voltage (V)

0 10 to 12
25 13 to 13.15
50 13.15 to 13.2
75 13.3 to 13.33
100 > 13.33

At the time and after chatting with technical experts at Johnson Outdoors I was told that I should have purchased two 12v chargers for LiFePO4 Batteries although one said I could use my current Minn Kota Digital two-bank charger to get the job done. However, to keep the warranty I needed to use a lithium charger or a 24 v lithium charger. I bought the 29.v 20 amp charger from the same company that I bought the batteries from.

The batteries come with a five-year warranty and are good up to 4000 cycles. That means I can run them down to nearly nothing and recharge them fully that many times. Many of the comments of Franco’s channel from his followers say that they seldom recharge them. Like 20-30 hours of use from them before charging.

In this entire process I actually managed to get my two batteries at different levels of charge. One was at 13.2 while the other was at 13.33. In order to recharge them with my 29.2v 20 Amp charger I needed to either charge up the 13.2 battery or discharge the 13.33 battery. I can’t charge one battery with a 29.2 v charge so I had to come up with a way to discharge just the one . 

Here was my system. 

I tried sticking the 12 volt trolling motor that came with my latest boat, the SeaArk, then filled a large tote with enough water from Rocky Run Creek to emerge the entire propeller in water. When I turned it on, water flew all over me, the floor, and anything near the motor. I quickly turned down the speed to 1. At that low level the motor would use less power and it still slurped, and slurped enough to add water to the floor of the garage. That didn’t bother because what garage floor doesn’t need a good washing? I turned it off a couple hours later and tested the voltage. Yikes! My battery still had 3.3 volts in it. 

The next morning when I went out to get the motor going again I was shocked when I saw that the tote I had under the water-filled tote had collapsed, spilling more water on the floor and breaking the cover on the bottom tote. The trolling motor idea wasn’t a good one.

In series my two batteries tested 26.4 volts which is plenty to run my Terrova 24 volt trolling motor so I did just That. I fished on Saturday, July 23rd with a new fishing partner ( a story to be told this week so stay tuned), I fished again the next day then fished two more days with Davy and on Thursday I went on the river alone and for an hour used only the trolling motor to go a mile up the river at a speed of 8 on the control or between 0.9 mph to 1.2 mph depending on the strength of the river current where I was. I did not recharge either battery after all that fishing. I figured there were about 17 hours of trolling motor operation and my batteries dropped to only 26.3 and actually the SOC Friday morning was 26.4

Even with that, 26.4 is only a 75% state of charge and I want a fully charged system. I decided to try another method to get my two batteries to the same State of Charge when they are at rest. 

A lot of years ago I purchased a used Lowrance Lo-K -Tor flashing fish finder. It was one of the original depth finder/fish locators ever produced. Old guys like me probably remember the green box that opened up to show a circular dial that lit up with a flashing light showing the depth a boat was and sometimes showed other blips on the dial if fish were between the bottom and the transducer. The power for those Lo-K-Tors was a pair of six volt batteries with the coils on the terminals and a simple circuit board that the batteries sat upon to give it power.

Over the course of several decades I accumulated a small collection of those green boxes and got them all working. I have transducers for them but I run them off small 12 v 9 AH or 7 AH batteries or I have even just hooked them up to my starter battery since it is 12 volts. It works and it’s fun from time to time to fish with original electrical technology. So today I hooked up all four of those green boxes to my battery that was higher in voltage than the other in an attempt to get it down to a restring charge of 13.20 volts. 

Laugh you might but it has worked better than the trolling motor attempt. I hooked up all four green boxes at 1 pm today. It’s now 8:50 pm at last check the battery is down to 13.20 volts under load but after resting for 30 minutes it’s at 13.21. So, I have to get it down one more tenth of a volt to even them out. When I accomplish that I need to connect the batteries in parallel for 24 hours in order for the BMS to balance them. Then I can fully charge them with the 29.2v 20 AH battery charger.

So there is some modern technological information for you. I always try to do several things within these Oshaukluta Outdoors stories: 1) entertain you 2) educate you 3) laugh at myself and hope that combination keeps you clicking in when I post a story.

I have four or five more stories in the hopper right now, including an exciting day in a new War Eagle with a Kowald, a day of learning about fishing from a 16-year old who is a great fisherman, several trips with Davy and my solo trip to explore a “Northeast Passage” on the Wisconsin River between the Dekorra landing and Portage.

Leave a comment if you’d like to and tell your outdoor friends about the stories. On Saturday met two people who read and enjoy the stories. The Second Bob’s parents were at the Lake Chippewa Campgound with the Second Bob, his wife and Larry and Mary, their sidekicks. Karol and I surprised them at the campground when we drove over there from our retreat west of Minong, WI.

Have a great day. If you have questions about LiFePO4 just click into YouTube or call me but remember – I do not consider myself a technical expert in the LiFePO4 field. I am an active learner though.

Bob

“If its not one thing it’s another

How often have you heard yourself say, “It just seems like it’s one thing after another:?

The past few weeks have been more than one thing coming at me when it comes to switching boats. I bought the boat on May 3rd. Today is July 21st. That’s 52 days. I had figured on being on the river, or Ugly Duckling Pond, and several other bodies of water by now but alas, two broken rods and two broken reels caused by switching boats changed all that. In yesterday’s Oshaukuta Outdoors Group’s story I mentioned that fishing can get pricey. 

I’m just going to mention it again – fishing can get pricey!

The LiFePO4 batteries arrived and now the 24 volt charger has been put to its task of getting a full charge into the batteries. That was accomplished today. Tomorrow I will concentrate on getting my Garmin 93sv locator mounted in the bow instead of the stern. I have the Lowrance back there that came with the SeaArk. I need to protect the transducer cable from the trolling motor as it moves left and right and goes into spot lock and spins both ways. It can wrap up a transducer cord and break it in a heartbeat and that too would be pricey. I have an alternate plan for the transducer and I will include a photo in the next report. The solution involves a piece of equipment that is no longer available but I have had one for a couple of decades or more and with “a little of this and a little of that,” I think I can cobble it together and make it work.

About two weeks ago I decided to follow through on my vow to rid myself of some fishing equipment. At one time I owned five boats, two canoes and my son’s kayak is here as well. . Now I own three boats, two canoes and the kayak is here as well. One boat and one canoe are at our “cabin” seven miles straight west of Jack Link’s Beef Jerky world headquarters in Minong, Wisconsin (home to Oshaukuta Outdoor Group member Brian Visger). 

I cleaned up my 14 foot Grumman that my father-in-law (Legendary Oshaukuta resident Bob Thompson) bought from Jack Link’s brother Bob at what I said was “Link’s Buy it all Right Here” back in the early 198os.

Once cleaned out I locked it to the big maple tree in the front yard where the DOT tells me 5000
+ cars a day go past. Some people stopped in and looked but nobody was willing to pay my asking price by giving me a call. The boat had never been in the rain after I added wooden decking, wooden rod lockers and storage boxes covered with carpeting. The plywood was not treated or exterior. It hadn’t rained here in Oshaukuta since May so I was confident it would stay dry. 

It didn’t!. Rain fell a few days later and then again after the boat had dried out. Then I started pulling it back into the garage.

Early last week one of the greatest River Man I know, the youngest member of the Great River Family, the Kowalds was looking at the boat when I came back from town. I pulled off the driveway and chatted with Trent and told him about the boat. My heart was beating fast because I wanted him to buy the boat. Not because I needed the money and wanted to get rid of it but because I knew he’d love that boat as much or more than I did. I also knew the boat would love him more than it did me because its hull will get wet a lot more often with Trent in it than with me on board. I was in it a lot but Trent, might just live in it. I was as happy for him as I was for the boat. I took his offer and gave him the “friends and family discount.” I also threw in the original middle seat, three boat seats, a fire extinguisher, and a bunch of other really neat river boat articles. 

I got a report from the youngest of the four Kowald boys I had as students, that the boat has already been used and that the new owner “loves the boat.” I also learned that he figured out that I had forgotten to tell him about the two screw holes in the transom that held the locator in place. I guess he figured that out quickly on his maiden voyage. Oops! I still have one more boat seat to give him so he may be selling boat seats in the near future. They are nice ones so if you are in the market look up Trent.

War Eagle Captain

Today I spent most of it in the garage working on the new batteries and the new chargers. By 9 pm tonight I had things the way they needed to be, then I tested out the trolling motor. It’s ready and begging me to get to work in the water. I saved some money by not buying a pricey locator swivel mount by taking some time to be creative. I should have made a YouTube video of me making it. My cost was zero save for four screws that would cost 11 cents and a 50 cent chunk of metal with holes in it. When done I painted it black and used what was left in a can of gloss clear coat. 

Here is another interesting topic I have been involved with. There is a fairly new competitor of Amazon’s online. It’s a Chinese company called Temu. The prices there are incredibly low so I wondered about the quality but took a shot at some fishing gear that wasn’t so pricey. I bought five Whopper Plopper lures in a plastic box for half the price of just one lure. I tried them out and they work as well as the ones I hand paint. I bought some shrink wraps and it works great. I bought some nylon rod socks, 2 for $4.28, a lot of spinner baits for about $1.58. They work great and are the variety with the loop to attach a small swivel and clip. I bought some knock off chatter baits and they work great.

A couple of days ago another Oshaukuta Outdoors Group member and only one of two OOG HOF members stopped in to see me. He had his grandson along who is already a great fisherman (how could the grandson of a Hall of Fame Fisherman not be a good fisherman himself? A week ago he and a friend caught 17 catfish below the Montello dam on –get this – a surface lure. Today I ordered some baits for him on Temu. There were 18 baits in all at an average cost of under $2. Whopper plopper type lures, five rubber frogs in varying colors and some crank baits.  

The SeaArk is all tricked out. It has three new batteries to provide DC power. It has two inflatable life vests that must be worn if you go on an adventure with me. You can bring your own rod and reel, your own tackle but leave your life vest at home – unless – you own one of your own or if you require a double XL.

That’s a wrap for now – tomorrow will see me on the river checking out the sand bars and getting to understand the SeaArk a bit better. Tomorrow’s adventure recap will be about my awesome river trip with the youngest Kowald brother in his new really awesome 18 foot War Eagle with 115 horses propelling it and a jack plate on the back. It’s amazing and there are a couple of hilarious side bars about it. 

Until then – Perhaps the number of things coming at me will slow down and the fishing will pick up

Have a great weekend!

Bob

More Glitches have arisen after switching boats

The Oshaukuta Outdoors Group

July 20, 2023

Who could have ever imagined that I’d upgrade my boat situation then have to park it in the garage for more than three weeks?

Soon after the boat ride with Gordon I invited Davy for a fishing trip. He is always up for a trip. On that trip we went up the river to Duck Creek and caught some rock bass and a few bluegills. The water was really shallow all the way up there so it was a tricky deal for the owner of a different boat he had not mastered yet. 

A couple days later we decided to go fishing again. We chose to launch at the first down-river launch area on Tipperary Road. The reason was that the river was really low and I wasn’t very good at getting the boat up and on plane and hadn’t figured out the jack plane use either. 

We got the boat in the water easily and aimed downstream past Wiersba’s totem pole to get lined up with the channel markers and up the river we went. We skimmed along nicely up past Focke’s Bluff then quickly negotiated the zag and then zig I wrote about in the last episode of this ongoing set of stories. We stopped under the interstate bridge to fish in the shade the lanes above provided. There was a small barge anchored just above the bridge with three fellas onboard at work. It seemed as though they were taking test samples of the river bottom so we figured it had something to do with the planned new bridge the Department of Transportation under Pete Buttigeig has announced. We learned that the anchor the Sea Ark is equipped with isn’t heavy enough to hold the boat in place in the current under the bridge unless we let out a lot of rope. 

While anchored there several people on personal watercraft zipped past us on their way up stream. The channel markers aligned with the channel that flows between the middle pillars that hold the road up above the water. Soon a larger watercraft with two people aboard was headed our way from downstream. They were going very fast and didn’t deviate between other pillars but instead roared right toward those guys on that small barge. Suddenly the workers started yelling at the driver of the watercraft to get farther away. The driver kept right on heading up stream and just like that they were right next to the fellas on the barge. By that time they were really yelling loudly telling the driver to stay farther away. The wake caused by the large watercraft quickly had the barge rocking and rolling and the workers were not happy.

We didn’t catch any fish under the bridge so I decided to go upstream into an area where I have caught bluegills, crappies and some pike. There was obviously some shallow water ahead of us. I knew that based upon the trip I took with Gordon a few days earlier. As we approached that shallow flat I pushed the switch for the jack plate so it would rise all the way up which would enable us to skim across the skinny water. Low and behold the jack plate did not move at all when I engaged the switch. I had to let off the throttle out of fear of the shallow water dead ahead. Once stopped I tried the jack plate again but it did not respond. I was puzzled at that point and as we drifted downstream I removed the battery cover and looked at the circuit breaker for the jack plate. The reset button had popped out for some reason or another. I pushed the reset button back in and tried the jack plate. It responded by going up. My thoughts obviously were about the possible cause of the circuit breaker popping off. 

Wisely I lowered the jack plate, trimmed the engine all the way down and headed back to the landing. We got back just fine and easily loaded up and headed home. Most of the conversation ride back to my place was about the circuit breaker issue. Ultimately I took into consideration the fact that it was a day in the low 90s and the sun was overhead. The battery box is not in an enclosed compartment but instead is out in the open next to the gas tank and directly in front of the engine. My thoughts were that the sun had been beating down on that black battery box cover which covers a black, plastic box. Perhaps the heat generated inside the box caused the circuit to break?

That’s the reason I am going with. When back home I tested the battery and the meter said 12.2. The day after I brought the boat home and came back from our adventure of dead batteries I had checked the charge and it was 9.2 volts. A good battery should test out at between 12.4 and 12.8 (according to my YouTube sources). Since that trip the battery has again tested at just 9.2. When a load tester was hooked up to the battery the final answer was —— Replace Battery. More testing revealed that the deep cycle battery for the trolling motor was also not charging correctly. I should have known when I bought the boat that new batteries were going to be in the equation. However, remember that on the night I bought the boat and sat in it until dark my thoughts never involved batteries.

Since that trip with Davy I have purchased two LiTime 12.8 volt deep cycle lithium batteries for my Minn Kota Terrova trolling motor as well as a charger that charges at 24 volts on lithium batteries and today found out I need to replace the outboard engine starter battery. 

Boating and fishing can get pricey! 

But then again so can golf. 

Good fishing to you! 

I will be back on the water by the weekend.

Have a great day!

Bob

A Day of Discovery

Tuesday, July 18, 2023

The Oshauluta Outdoors Group

It was a discovery tour for both of us

On Full plane and the jack plate as high as it goes, we skimmed over the sand bars that had about a foot of water flowing over them.

I bought the SeaArk because it is a river boat. It’s a river man’s craft. 

The next trip occurred the day after the trip the last story was about. The one where the former owner taught me a bit about the boat I now own. 

Another friend told me he would like to go for a boat ride in the boat so after a cup of coffee and some carving fun at his place we met later in the day for a trip on the Wisconsin River. 

I knew the water was pretty skinny going up stream because there were a lot of concrete slabs out of the water at the Dekorra landing. Therefore I chose to go down stream instead. I knew that the marker buoys marking the channel can’t tell the true story on the channel on the Dekorra side of the river. We got the boat in the water easily and I shoved us off. 

As we headed downstream I chose to take a chance on the flow going on the Caledonia side of the river just across from Hooker’s Resort. I got the boat up and on plane in a hurry because I’d learned a lot from watching YouTube videos. First you trim the engine all the way down then hit the throttle full bore. The bow and Gordon rose up above the river and I counted one, one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand then starting dressing the trim button on the end of the tiller to get the engine into the “sweet spot” so the boat would quickly get on plane. I think it was more luck than skill but we were off like the speed horse out of the gate at the Kentucky Derby. We were riding high on the water and I made a perfect river read to get through the deepest slot across from Hooker’s.
I was leaning left and right trying to keep my read on the river because I was having trouble seeing things with a passenger in the bow. About the time I had to make a decision on a route, another speedy boat, going faster than us passed us on the port side. The operator of that craft waved at me as if to say, “Hey I know where I’m going so follow me!”

I thought to myself, “OK at the speed you are going I am going to trust you.” He cut to the north through a small cut between two islands and I followed him. I had to get between a stick jutting out into that narrow slot and the portside bank but his bubble stream showed me the way. I followed him from a distance because I could not keep up but things went smoothly. We zipped under Interstate 39-90-94 at about 30 mph then skimmed over a bar with about 18 inches of water. By that time our leader was quite a ways ahead of us. As we turned to the  left and headed straight toward the up river end of Dr. Focke’s Bluff I saw our leader zig left sharply then he zagged right. The marker buoys there were marking what deep enough water there was.  It was a matter of about a minute and we were skimming over the water past the large sand island across from what was once Lang’s Lodge and The Nip N Sip. 

I kept on going and before I knew it we were at the head of Lake Wisconsin. My passenger wanted to see where the grade was, so we zipped past Tipperary point and across the water toward Camp Perry/Helleckson’s Resort  (now Lakeside) supper club.  Gordon saw the Grade so I turned hard to the starboard side and we headed back toward the Dekorra Landing. I’d found the sweet spot on the trim button and was enjoying everything about the ride except the grains of sand hitting me in the face.The sand was blowing off the floor of the boat. They felt like tiny darts hitting me head on. I didn‘t have any sunglasses with me so that was miserable.

We made it back to the Dekorra landing without any negative adventure occurrences. It was a great trip for both of us. Gordon got to see the river, the sand bars, island, dead trees, cottages and more. I had a chance to familiarize myself with the boat.

The tunnel hull under the SeaArk and the jack plate are really the ticket to running shallow water. I was happy with my progress but knew I had a lot more to learn about the new vessel I found myself owning.

The dead trees along the river are a sad story, one I will write about in a future river story.

Until the next post – enjoy the weather and have some outdoor fun.

Bob

It was a trip about learning and well worth my time

Monday, July 17, 2023 – The Oshaukuta Outdoors Group
Bob Tomlinson

When I bought the SeaArk from Don in Sun Prairie I asked him to go for a ride with me on the river. He had fished the stretch of the Wisconsin River from the Dekorra landing to the mouth of Duck Creek many times. He is a trolling fisherman looking for walleyes.

He arrived at the agreed upon time and we headed for the landing at Dekorra. I told him to do the piloting while I rode in the bow and watched and listened to the things he would teach me. 

I was learning all about tilt, trim and jack plate vocabulary and technique. In addition to the operational part of the SeaArk I was also learning about the electronics on board, the running lights, bilge pump switch and more. We cruised up the river toward the mouth of Duck Creek with me giving him some historical perspective on that particular stretch of water. He had never gone farther up the river than that point so I became the navigator and took him to the mouth of the Baraboo. The water was pretty skinny but we did manage to cut across from the Baraboo to the Pacific side of the river. We didn’t go very far however. 

We turned around and made our way back to Duck Creek where we started casting toward the bank with some rubber baits. I had never fished that way so it wasn’t long and I’d got hung up on a branch or log larger than my outfit could beat so I lost one of his jigs and of course the rubber offering attached to it. Not long after I lost that rig Don got hung up and also had to re-rig his rod. 

After I retired from teaching and took my first trip up the river, I noticed a small cut on the Dekorra side of the river that had been created by high water. At  point “the cut” was only about six or eight feet across. As the river flows I knew that the cut was going to just keep getting wider and wider and in time would most likely become the spot where most of the water goes. The cut was occurring with some large trees on both sides of the current rushing through there. 

Adlo Leopold wrote about the shifting sands of the Wisconsin River in his book “A Sand County Almanac.” He wrote about the water always changing the look of the river and with its shifting islands. Every time the river rises and rushes toward the Gulf of Mexico it both tears down and creates at the same time. If you traverse the river often enough you notice every subtle change. A couple examples are a spot on Lib’s Island (named after Liberty Cross who owned it before the power company took control. About a third of the way up river with Lib’s Island on the port side there has been a nice little slough where many fish have been caught. I have always referred to it as Grandma Tomlinson’s Slough after my grandmother who loved to fish in that spot. On one outing when I was a young lad she caught a very large northern pike on her cane pole and that was a forever memory for me watching her hold off a mid-30s green fish. “The River Men ” as I call them, the Kowald clan ,refer to that slough as “The Toilet Bowl,” not because of human waste in there but the way the water would swirl in high water when it went over the banks. Today, that slough has water running through it from the DeKorra side all the time but also from the Caledonia side in high water times. In a matter of time it will be impossible to get in there because the sand is quickly filling in the entrance. When “The Cut ” becomes the main channel down through what has been for decades Davis’ Slough, (named after the Davis family who owned the property on both sides of County JV. Grandma’s slough may be just a pond on the end of Lib’s Island. It will get refilled periodically with high water in the river. A second spot is what I always called Ivy Island. It was a small island set right between the old channel on the Caledonia side where the Baraboo river comes around the bluff and most of the water from the Wisconsin does during normal flow times. Ivy Island was named by me because most of the flora on it was poison ivy but still, campers chose that island every weekend. Now the island is actually two very tiny ones soon to be completely washed away. The trees will wind up on the bottom or cast aside along the shorelines and the sand will further impede the flow of the current and shift the deeper water back and forth across the channel.

As Don and I drifted with the current I chose to switch approaches and replaced his jig and rubber minnow with a hand-painted water splasher (brand name in the store is Whopper Plopper) with a white body and loon spots painted in black. It has an orange chin and red pectoral fins. Don questioned my wisdom of throwing that thing into all the gaps between trees, logs and branches along the shorelines but I knew what I was doing because I do it all the time. It’s the way I catch fish. Not long after he questioned my approach I made a perfect cast and after about two cranks of the reel the water splasher was stuck in the jam of a nice smallmouth bass. I quickly yanked the fish out of the log jam and battled with it in open water. I was the winner in that battle. It was a beautiful 17”-18” smallie. I removed the plug and dropped the fish back into the drink. 

That was about all the excitement for that trip but I had learned a lot about the boat and how it handles. It was an important river trip for me. 

Next up is a story about our long river trip from Dekorra to Lake Wisconsin but you’ll have to wait until tomorrow to read about that adventure.

Have a great day!

Bob

Our First Voyage in the SeaArk – Not what we were anticipating

Oshaukuta Outdoors Group 

Bud Probably Figured The Trip Would Be an Adventure

There is no way he could have envisioned what took place

It was my first trip in the Captain’s Chair

When Bud and I spoke the night before about making a river trip, I was sitting atop the boat in the Captain’s Chair. We agreed to meet at my place around 8 am. Naturally, Bud arrived a few minutes early but I was ready and excited to get going. 

I had loaded some fishing equipment in the boat and Bud had stopped and purchased some squirmy critters that live in the ground and come out after dark and especially after a rain shower earlier in the day or at night when they are doing their thing on top of the earth. 

We arrived at the Dekorra landing where four slabs were out of the water at the launch site. That meant that there would certainly be enough water for me to negotiate my latest craft to the mouth of Duck Creek, the mouth of the Baraboo and to the mouths of Jackfish Slough and even Two Bobs Slough. So I was really pumped for this adventure.

Bud is 92-years-young and I say that with the utmost respect and truth. I’d bet on Bud to keep up on a hike with any of the other Oshaukuta Outdoors Group members. Spend just a few minutes with Bud and you will be hooked. He is amazing and I am fortunate to have him in my life since he returned to Wisconsin after about 50 years of being away from Poynette. Bud is as genuine a friend as any person could ask for. 

On the day of our trip I could tell that Bud shared my excitement about the trip about to commence. He stumbled a bit getting into the boat in a hurried-up manner and I had to tell him to just sit down and I’d push us off the beach area. The boat floats higher in the water than the Grumman we were accustomed to. It floated there like a blown up beach ball. It was easy for me to shove off and hop in without getting even a toe of my Crocks wet.

I scurried to the back of the boat, settled into the Captain’s chair and got ready to hit the start button on the Evinrude Etec. The current was moving at a normal speed, between 3-4 mph on this particular morning. It was perfect conditions for a first trip.

Thank our lucky stars for that!

By the time I got situated in the Captain’s seat we’d moved down steam about 10 yards and away from the launch area. I pushed the trim button on the handle of the tiller and watched and listened as the outboard went all the way to the bottom of the trim. I said something like, “hang on Bud” we’re about to take off. 

I reached across the tiller with my right hand and depressed the starter button. Nothing happened! There was no sound of an outboard engine turning over, not even a click. I quickly realized that I’d forgotten to turn on the switch. Afterall, this was my first trip in this boat and my other boat did not have a keyed switch to turn on. I felt a lot better about things when I realized the key was not switched on. I told Bud how stupid I felt as I made the long reach back to the key and turned it on.

By that time we had drifted with the current for about 30-35 yards. I quickly depressed the starter button again expecting to hear the 50 horses inside that black beauty sort of say “Hydee Ho, here we go!”

Nothing! No sound, no click, absolutely nothing. Then it hit me. “Bud, the battery must be dead.”

As I sat in the Captain’s chair until dark the night before my thoughts never, not once centered around the fact that the boat had only been in the water once in 2022 and that was in the spring of the year. I knew that but failed to remember to charge the batteries. 

Yes, batteries, not one but two. When the outboard didn’t start I told him not to fret because we had a 50 pound thrust Minn Kota Power Drive V2 with I-Pilot at the bow of the SeaArk. 

By this time we were looking up at the center of Dekorra Park and moving with the current toward the Gulf of Mexico. I quickly moved to the front, slipping past bud and traded places with him. I got the Power Drive off its side and into the water quickly. It was then that I realized that my luck, our luck hadn’t changed. I had never used the remote for this particular trolling motor. I have a remote for my Terrova but it is a bit different from the one that controls the one on the SeaArk. 

I needed to learn fast as we were getting closer and closer to Hooker’s Resort. I got my readers on and took a good look and depressed a button on the remote and it turned on. I knew enough to push the button that would make the motor whirrr. 

There was very little whirr. You see, I had not charged the trolling motor deep cycle battery either. There was enough power there however to just sort of hold us in one spot but I knew it would not take long to lose what little DC power we had. 

If someone would have been there to see the scene on the river that a 73-year-old and a 92-year-old had going on, they’d have this story to tell their friends. 

I thought about jumping overboard and swimming the boat down to Hooker’s then hiking back to the parking lot to get the truck but I knew we’d never get the boat on the trailer at Hooker’s. That landing is very steep and the current picks up more speed there due to the island out in front and a narrow channel. My only shot was to get the boat over toward  the newly placed stone that Dylan and Greg Falk placed along the shoreline at the park. Miraculously the trolling motor battery was still turning at about the slowest speed it could without stopping. I was able to get the vessel to those jagged rocks. Fortunately for us, Don, the previous owner, had left a nice tow rope in the boat. It’s about 25 feet long. I grabbed the looped end of the rope and carefully stepped over the portside gunwale onto those scary looking rocks. 

The issue facing us now would be the current pushing us toward the shoreline and the fact that the shoreline is not a straight shot. That meant that there were jagged protrusions sticking out like tiny peninsulas into the river. 

I was wearing a pair of Crocs. They are not really rock climbing footwear. Know what I mean? They got wet and were very slippery. I had to take my time and pick out the best rocks to land on and fear that I’d miss and get my ankle caught between two of those things. I moved slowly along all the while having to tow the boat with Bud in it. Bud in the meantime had to lead over the gunwale and shove the craft back out into the current so I could “line it” back toward the Dekorra landing. 

We were doing pretty well and that 92-year-old young guy in the boat was doing a great job. About halfway back to private land on the upriver side of the park shoreline my left foot slipped off a rock and sure enough, my foot was wedged between two jagged chunks. If I had let go of the rope Bud would have been headed for the Prairie du Sac dam so I had to twist and turn my ankle to get it “unstuck.” After a bit I managed to get a bloody foot out of the crevice it had been in. Bud was leaning over the gunwale keeping the boat out in the water and off of the rocks. 

The biggest issue we had, especially for Bud, was this. As I pulled the boat from 25 feet in front of the bow it tracked right at me. That meant that the point of the bow was always heading for the jagged rocks jutting out into the water. Bud’s job was to keep the bow pointed toward the water. To do that he had to lean his belly over the gunwale and use both hands to push off the rocks. It wasn’t an easy job. 

Slowly we made our way back up the shoreline. Once we reached the private property on the up-river side of the park I waded out into the river and towed the boat back to the landing. It took a while but we had made a successful trip. Once safely at  the landing, we quickly got the boat loaded and headed for my house. I apologized many times on the trip home for not preparing in a proper manner. When things settled down I set up some targets and grabbed a couple of 22s and we made lots of holes in paper and spun the green crow target around the hoop it is attached to.

Bud is still waiting for his first successful voyage in the SeaArk. We are hoping to get there soon and often.

Since that first trip I have had the boat back on the water a few times including a trip that took us from the DeKorra landing to Lake Wisconsin and back, a trip from one of the Tipperary landings up river to the Interstate bridge and more. 

Those stories and more are scheduled for the coming week. 

Have a great day and until tomorrow —–

Enjoy some outdoor time if you get the chance, while all the while keeping the Canadian wildfire smoke causing unhealthy air in mind. 

Bob

It isn’t New but it’s a Beauty

It’s not a new boat by any stroke of the imagination but it’s in my garage now and not its former resting place in Sun Prairie.

When I retired from teaching 12 years ago I decided to spend much more time on the water with fishing rods in my hands. My craft at the time was a late 1970s or early 1980s Grumman 14’ modified V jon boat type of vessel. It was equipped with a 20 HP. 15” (short shaft) Johnson outboard. It could move me up-river at about 27-29 mph and down stream under normal river flow at about 29-30 mph.

I did a lot of fishing from that vessel but needed to “trick out the boat” to be able to use it the way I wanted to enjoy the outings. I built a rod locker on the starboard side and a series of four storage boxes on the port side and one was insulated so I would not have to toss in a cooler to keep live bait fresh and beverages cold. It wasn’t pretty but it was efficient. 

 In 2018 the top of the outboard vibrated enough that fixing it was going to be more expensive than it would be worth. Using some funds from my mother’s estate, I bought a 2018 25 HP four stroke Yamaha outboard. It took me nearly a year to get the 10-hour break-in hours under my belt because I didn’t go very far on my fishing adventures. It took me less than 10 minutes to get to Duck Creek from the Dekorra landing, 12 minutes to the mouth of Duck Creek and about 14 minutes to get to Jackfish and Two Bob Sloughs. Many times I just fished in Davis’ slough.

As much fun as I had in that boat I yearned for a 16’ vessel which would create a better fishing atmosphere for a partner to go with me. Add to this and the fact that the outboard does not have tilt and trim, shallow water gave me some issues from time to time. I read the river as well as the great river navigators like the Kowald brothers but on a few occasions what looked like depth enough to scoot through proved to be a bit shallow. I need about 16” when on plane to skim across those shallow bars. 

My great fiend Larry over in Baraboo has a great river boat that he found at an amazing price. It’s a 16’ SeaArk with a tunnel hull equipped with a 40 HP  Mercury jet for propulsion. I drooled every time Larry invited me along for a fishing trip. 

I started coveting a SeaArk vessel with a tunnel hull and a jet outboard but could never find a deal like the one Larry found. However, I never stopped wishing and looking at the market place and other places.

When my Grumman sprung a leak back in September I started thinking more about a different vessel to give me more adventures than the Grumman could provide. I fixed the leak but kept looking and wishing.

In late May I started to see some 16’ SeaArk boats with tunnel hulls meant for use with an outboard engine with a prop. I thought to myself that perhaps that would be OK so I started looking closer. In the meantime my friend Mike B told me about a great deal on an older bass boat with lots of bells and whistles and a 115 HP Mercury outboard. The price was a great one and I nearly sprang for that boat. However, it wasn’t really the craft I wanted to take to the dance. My heart was set on a SeaArk 16’ MVT. 

On the day I nearly sprung for the bass boat I gave a final check to the market place and three used SeaArk boats appeared. I inquired about one of them and set up a time to go check the boat out south of Madison. Before I exited the market place another listing popped onto my screen. It was a 16’ SeaArk MVT – the make and model I craved since I retired. The best part was that it was in Sun Prairie.

 I called Don, the owner and within a couple of hours I was falling in love with this 1998 SeaArk 16MVT tunnel hull craft. It was dressed out in an Evinrude 50 HP with a tiller, power tilt and trim and an Atlas Micro ;jackplate, a Minn Kota PowerDrive 50 lb. Thrust trolling motor with I-Pilot and a Lowrance 10” HDS fish locator. It included a Cabella’s two-bank charger, a deep cycle battery and one for starting the outboard and providing 12 volt power for electronics, running lights, a great Shoreland trailer with three new tires including the spare. Don, the previous owner, tricked out the boat with a plywood floor, carpeting, and an onboard cell phone charger that doubles as a LED battery meter.

I fell in love with that boat the moment I saw it. Before we left I’d paid for the boat and promised I’d be back yet that late afternoon to take it home with me. I invited Don along for my first river trip so he could teach me a little about operating my latest adventure creator. I bought it on June 5th and we did a river trip four days later. 

When I got the boat home I petted it as if it were a new puppy. I hugged the Evinrude ETec and crawled up and into the business part of the vessel where I patted the seats and explored the cabin area. After an evening meal I got myself back up into the boat and simply sat in the Captain’s chair until after dark. While in that seat I called my great friend Bud and invited him to go for my maiden voyage in the morning. He excitedly said, YES!
I hardly slept all night in anticipatory excitement. 

Older River Boat — New Owner

That’s where the next adventure really starts.

Next Up tomorrow is the first real adventure story with this latest watercraft.

Have a great day and thanks for reading.

A River Man 

Bob