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This guide is for 8' to 15' jon boats. Jon boats are designed to be a multi-purpose utility / small fishing boat. Their flat bottoms make them very stable and only require a few inches of water to float. The basic issue is the wider the boat the more the stability right to left. The beam or top width of jon boats also improves stability if wider but not as quite as much as bottom width. If you are on a river or pond and the shore to your landing area is shallow for a long distance... a jon boat may be what you need. If you want the most stability at a stopped position, look at mini pontoon boats. A tunnel hull adds a level of efficiency on boats over 16 feet, but not very noticeable on smaller boats. Although wider boats improve stability and capacity, it increases friction which slows down the boat and eats more gas. Modified V Hull Jon Boat Once you have determined that a flat bottom jon boat is for you, decide next if the water in the lake, bay or river has a fair amount of chop on it. You may need a modified V hull. The front of the boat is shaped in the form of a V to cut the chop and provide a safe more comfortable ride. We think you rarely sacrifice stopped stability on a modified V, if you don't overload the front of the boat. If the boat you are interested in is 8' to 10' there are no modified V production units in the market, because at that point you would sacrifice stability. If the chop on your lake sometimes gets over the height of the bow, a modified V hull would be much smoother and provide a drier safer ride. If the chop is regularly over your bow, we would recommend you look at a Tri-Hull boat or full V hull boat with a deeper bow. If you are unsure which boat is right for you call toll free at 877-924-8155 and ask for a boat sales specialist. Jon Boat Construction Jon boats are built differently for different situations. Some are better suited for salt or brackish water for example. All aluminum jon boats are single hulled so the water never gets trapped. The thicker the gauge in both poly and aluminum the heavier and longer the boat will last dragging up on the shore. Rivets in aluminum boats have a tendency to leak if they hit rocks or stumps... if you are going to go down rivers in those conditions we recommend you go with either a polyethylene or an all welded aluminum jon boat. The boat transom(engine mounting area) is commonly reinforced with wood in both aluminum and double hulled polyethylene boats... keep in mind wood rots eventually. Polyethylene boats don't dent like aluminum boats and are great for rocky rivers, just check out whats hidden in between the hulls and how they are attached and you will know what your boat can take and how to maintain it. Polyethylene Jon boats boats have typical construction problems with the rivets that join the hull and deck together. The glue that is used does not dry because really nothing much sticks to polyethylene, unless you heat weld it. Currently none of the poly jon boats are heat welded so therefore the seam fails as soon as the never drying thick glue slides down the boat. This is a slow process and it will usually stay at least through the warranty period of the boat manufacturers put on them. Once the seam fails water gets in between the hull and deck even if it rains... and especially when you use it. This can be challenging to say the least because the boat ends up weighing a ton. Fiberglass boats are proven to hold up in salt water no matter what. Aluminum boats can be used in salt water, but the gauge, type of aluminum, transom construction, type of rivets, paint coating all play a roll in how long it will last. My USCG sticker says my boat has different capacities than the DirectBoats.com web site, why? If you see a United States Coast Guard sticker on a boat it means the coast guard regulates the person capacity. Some boats are not required to have a USCG sticker for example most canoes and kayaks are not. Most of the capacities we post on the web site are manufacturer max capacity numbers which include persons motor and gear. Some customers get the person capacity mixed up with the max capacity, the USCG stickers read X persons OR Y lbs. The "OR" means you can put either that many people OR that much people weight. The coast takes the highest mortality rate boats then puts a rating on them with safety factor built in to help protect the public. |
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