# new skiff



## deerfly (Mar 10, 2007)

For those that don't know its a Panga Marine "Skiff 18" www.pangamarine.com. Rob McDaniel and his guys are great to work with. They make some very affordable boats for their size and very efficient too, highly recommended for sure.   The Continental trailer came from captnron and the Skiff Shop, also highly recommended. Anyway enough of the shameless promotion... 

At 18' LOA with a 6' beam its not exactly a micro(sorry admin persons), but definitely fits my "do more with less" mantra perfectly. Compared to my beloved 14' Mitchell that I just sold, I give up almost nothing in the skinny and gain a lot more open water, inlet and offshore jaunts in stable weather. Easily towed with my 4cyl yota too. 

I have a Yamaha 50TLR tiller to hang on it and based on others experiences should get mid to upper 30's with that and somewhere between 8-10mpg.

Not surprisingly, I ordered the boat "bare bones" with the hardware in a box, which amounted to 4 very nice Accon stainless steel folding pop-up cleats. The factory installed the rub rail, bow and towing eye's and ran a wire chase under each gunwale. I don't plan to do much more with it either. All it "needs" is some push pole holders and the engine bolted on.   OK, there may be a few other things...  

I may or may not put a poling platform on it. I never bothered to put one on my Mitchell and certainly don't "need" one on this boat, although I suspect I'll end up with one. No arguing the height advantage, especially to be able to see what the angler on the bow see's for those times we need to work in harmony. Regardless, I'm going to wait until I use the boat a bit for that.

The biggest "rigging" dilemma I have is horizontal rod storage under the gunwales. I didn't like the "factory" option on this, so elected to do something on my own. Nothing wrong with the factory setup though, it's just that it was generic 2 rod per side kind of thing and I think I can squeeze in room for 3 rods especially because I fly fish a lot and they require quite as much space and conventional rods. There are a few prefabricated types of holders out there that I'm considering but may just build the typical notched "shelves" using the same high density foam that the deck and platforms are built with and epoxy/glass them in. I have 10' of open cockpit space between the fore and aft platforms, but may put tubes under the foredeck anyway as an added measure of protection for the top 1/3rd of the rods. I'll update the thread with what ever I decide tho.

I have portable LED navigation lights that I used on the Mitchell and really like them. I can certainly use them on this boat too, however, since this boat more or less requires a battery(engine TnT), I may go ahead and install permanent LED bow and stern lights. Not sure yet tho. Since I like to fish a lot at night I will definitely be installing under gunwale LED courtesy lights and probably under the fore and aft decks too. 

The hull is 100% self bailing so I don't need a bilge pump, but for those inlet and offshore adventures I will rig up an 1100gph portable setup that I can hang the exhaust over the transom in the motor well cutout when I want to use it. 

Bait well is/will be portable too. Its a 22gal oval, rigged with two pumps, one for inflow and one for outflow and when not pumping in the inflow is redirected for recirculating. 

Passenger seating will be a combination of folding captains chairs and marine grade bean bags. Put em' in when I need em', take em' out when I don't (goes for both passengers and seating implements  ;D)

One of the uses for the boat that I didn't anticipate is smuggling refugee's. 

Trey under the foredeck









Trey and Chloe under the foredeck(she could have fit all the way in but doesn't like her brother that much  )









Both of them under the rear deck









Lastly, Trey says he wants to sit here in rough weather...









Today we're fine tuning the trailer bunks and guide posts then we'll mount the engine and take it out for a test ride. I have a 5" setback manual jack plate that I'll eventually install and try too, but not until I have some time with the engine directly on the transom. I suspect the jack plate will be the final solution since I predominately fish and run shallow, but I need to give it a fair trial with both configurations. 

Stay tuned...


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## iMacattack (Dec 11, 2006)

Looks great! And yes it's not a micro, but it does look tippy. ;D









Great picture!


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## gheenoeguy (Mar 27, 2007)

Congrats,I love the boat and came very close to buying one myself.


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## Lil_Tate (Dec 18, 2006)

very nice...


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## Captain_Shane (Mar 27, 2007)

Cool boat! Love the open cockpit.


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## MATT (Apr 30, 2007)

so yours is bigger then RJ's


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## mark_gardner (Mar 18, 2009)

nice rig, congrats on your new machine [smiley=1-beer.gif]


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## iMacattack (Dec 11, 2006)

Found you a new tiller motor!


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## adc77 (Jul 23, 2009)

nice ride! i looked at them but i was looking for a package and lets just say there mark up on extras like trailer,motor, etc. was a little too much for my liking. looks like your doing it the right way.


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## Tom_C (Dec 10, 2006)

Congrats [smiley=1-thumbsup1.gif]


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## CAJUN (Dec 10, 2006)

congrats on the new boat. was wondering if anyone has ever run an 18' using a 25hp?


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## backwaterbandits (Dec 15, 2006)

Looks great, congrats!
I would love a test ride if our paths ever
cross again... 
Good luck with her, Dave


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## noeettica (Sep 23, 2007)

I Really Like It     Dave


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## orlgheenoer (Dec 10, 2006)

Sweet boat dude, should serve you well. I am surprised I don't see more on the Water.


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## deerfly (Mar 10, 2007)

boat looked pretty good on the trailer when I got home, but once I tried putting the guide posts on I could see it was a bit off center. Thinking I could deal with myself, laying on my back with my feet holding the boat up off the runners, didn't work out so well. So I had to resort to my "third" hand for a little assistance.  










all better now...









Next was mounting the engine. No way I was doing this without my third hand either. 









Won't bore you with the details here, but suffice to say if you end up having to mount one find someone with a BIA pattern template. 

OK, motor is on, time for a little starty starty to see how she purs on the new rig...









Ran fine, but not with the throttle cable connected to the carburator.  :-? I had to disconnect that and operate the carb linkage by hand to get it to run. Seems I had me a little issue with the throttle linkage. After a couple conference calls with Captnron (he has the same engine/tiller etc) it seems I had the wrong end connector. 

You can see the threads past the point where the throttle needs to be in order to idle. (I like to go fast as much as the next guy, but not at the ramp when I first start the motor.  









Here's the connector threaded on to the cable. If it were connected this position would be WFO with the tiller grip handle set to idle.  ;D









Of course it's late Saturday afternoon on Labor Day weekend, so there was no quick run to the neighborhood Yamaha outboard parts store for another one.  : Not if we were going to take her for a ride in the morning anyway. 

So I did what any self respecting ******* would do. I re-engineered what I had to work with. Which amounted to cutting about 5/16'ths off the threaded end of the push rod and also reusing the connector only cut short and re-drilled to slip over the throttle bell crank.  









After a couple small adjustments she worked like a champ.   

Boat is ready to load up in the morning and go for a ride.









small detour in the rigging and setup issues...
http://www.microskiff.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1252441699/0#0


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## deerfly (Mar 10, 2007)

> nice ride!   i looked at them but i was looking for a package and lets just say there mark up on extras like trailer,motor, etc. was a little too much for my liking.  looks like your doing it the right way.


The factory options are a bit high on average, but Rob will work with you any way you want.


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## deerfly (Mar 10, 2007)

> Looks great, congrats!
> I would love a test ride if our paths ever
> cross again...
> Good luck with her, Dave


Dave, any time we can work something out you're more than welcome. I need to come down St. Pete way and learn some dock lights for snook. Maybe we could do something like that. Kill two birds with one stone.


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## beavis (Dec 11, 2006)

there goes the neighborhood.


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## deerfly (Mar 10, 2007)

> congrats on the new boat.   was wondering if anyone has ever run an 18' using a 25hp?


I haven't, but considered it myself since I had a strong 25hp Tohatsu before I bought this boat. After talking with the factory and other's that already owned them(beavis), I decided to go with a 50hp instead. Of course running into a good deal on a very low hour 50hp helped too. 

I would say after running the boat a couple days with the 50hp though, I could believe they'd run OK with a 25hp as long as you kept the payload light, like one person and some gear or maybe 1 adult, a kid and modest gear, etc. It's a lot of boat for a 25hp. IMHO to get the most out of a hull like this you'd want 40hp+. 

If you already have the engine though (like I did) I wouldn't worry too much, go ahead and get the boat and start enjoying it. You can always re-power it at some point in the future...


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## Canoeman (Jul 23, 2008)

"My mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes of thought, careening through a cosmic vapor of invention."  
Hedley Lamar, Blazing Saddles

Beautiful boat. I really like that design.


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## Gramps (Nov 1, 2007)

> "My mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes of thought, careening through a cosmic vapor of invention."


Ditto!


Nice boat Deerfly!  How much higher is the front deck than the rear at rest?


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## Flyline (Mar 3, 2008)

That's perfect for tarpon/permit/nearshore panga skiff!

Love the open room!

I'm digging this huge casting deck and I'm sure it's perfect for flyfishing! 

Congrats Deerfly!


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## pancholo (May 10, 2009)

that boat is perfect size and the simplistic approach at the riging... dude that is an amazing skifff. Congrats on your new bote!


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## deerfly (Mar 10, 2007)

> > "My mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes of thought, careening through a cosmic vapor of invention."
> 
> 
> Ditto!
> ...


From a static measurement off the sole there is a 3" difference(rear 12.5", fore 15.5"). However, there is an up sweep to the sole along the sheer line too, so the relative difference is more than 3", probably closer to 6" Naturally, the boat doesn't sit in the water the same as it sits on the trailer either so that total difference is equalized a bit on the water. I'll have to try to measure that next time I'm out in it though.


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## noeettica (Sep 23, 2007)

Another "Honest" Boat Gotta love it 

Dave


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