PaddyT

My vote- and thats without having looked at the boats would be the Brooker- you will love having electric start and trim and it sounds like a package ready to rock and roll. The motor will last forever=and without wanting to start a debate I wouldnt go near an ETEC with only 1 yr warranty left- especially if the previous owner has followed Evinrudes 300hr first service nonsense. Just check the trailer for excessive rust and get someone who is experienced to have a look at the trailer set up(90 % of hull cracks are caused by poor trailer set ups). On purchase replace the wheel bearings straight away - trust me on this- and youll be ready to go. As for the hull thickness- these are all small tinnies, they will flex and bounce in chop, dont drive them too hard and they will last just about forever

I only use it for heavy tackle when doing a lot of casting - half hitches wont lock the knot sufficiently when under heavy pressure- Rizzuto finish is an excellent finish for the FG , biminis etc

Yep Ive got a 5.4 m CC (TABS) - I can bottom bash, spin for pelagics,soft plastics for jew /flatties, crab, catch marlin, downrig for kings, flyfish, troll for trout, sleep on the floor etc

For the type of fishing you do why wouldnt you get a center console- in a 17ft boat a half cab destroys a huge amount of usable space and you end up having to fishing "around" your boat rather than fishing "allaround" your boat. Al or glass doesnt matter that much for what you are trying to do

yep-going trout fishin'-mind u its meant to be 4 below up the mountains

One major problem with this-the carpet will now be glued to the bondcrete- the bondcrete will not remain adhered to the plywood in any sort of wet conditions at all as it has very poor water resistance- so the carpet will lift off- much better to sand the plywood to help the adhesive key into the timber before putting carpet on. There are epoxy sealers for marine ply that is continuously wet - go to a marine supplier but for a tinnie floor its probably not needed as long as you let the boat dry in the sun enough

+1-always check with the skipper-if he wants something on his boat its his call.

Set of scales, drag should be 1/3 of breaking strain of line, set through the rod not straight off the reel

Walk towards the rocks from the surf club and you will go down into a small gully with lots of boulders and a high rock on the left- thats Mugs, but with a short rod its easier to go a bit further and fish the first low ledge - cleats can be a good idea as it can have weed and slime growth- its about a 50 meter walk from the surfclub. The next little ledge is called "Picketts" and is really only a low tide option, then the "front" is the main ledge all the way round to the "gulf"- big rock channel at the end of the main ledge

Pike are better king bait than yakkas

Mugs Rock at Avoca (first low bit of the platform) usually has tailor at dawn - fish are usually gone as soon as the sun pops up, its low to the water so a short rod is more than usable (used to spin it all the time with a flick stick)

sand flats are the safest and most interesting place for small kids, when they get bored with fishing they can build sandcastles, chase soldier crabs, splash in the shallows and they have nowhere to fall on (rocks,wharves etc). The flats at Gunnamatta on lowtide , beach at Kurnell etc

You arent far from Bandit there-a lot of Yellowfin came of that reef back in the 80's before the inshore run dissappeared, and most of them got caught May-July

between 2-2.5 hours behind Fort Denison depending on how far upstream you are

Circles dont work as well on "slash and grab " merchants like tailor , strips of yakka or pillie fillets under a small bobby cork work fine-gang of two light gauge hooks and a nice strip bait. Takes me back to my teen years when the only place my parents would drive to was Balmoral and I caught thousands off the "island" doing just that-bloody long time ago

Most trannies sold these days run 2 frequencies so I doubt there is high demand for a switch plus with the improved computing power available means you dont need to choose between the transducers- you can view both . I run a Lowrance Gen2 with two screens and two transducers 50/200 and the LSS2 sidescan-the whole thing is networked via the LSS2 box but from my understanding the GEn 3 and up head units have enough computing power not to need the box. The more complex CHIRP units use a CHIRP box for networking

If you can get past the smell

Ok- that sounder is in a terrible location-totally invisible from the boats cockpit and barley visible whilst driving im guessing, think carefully about what you are trying to achieve- are you a serious enough fisho that you want to use your sounder to help you catch fish or is it just something to fill a whole in the dash. I would mount it wherever you can see it and change the settings the easiest. Think about relocation all the gauges or rip em out and interface the motor with whatever sounder /combo you buy. Think lots , drill once

Chuck it out and wind it back at a medium pace- most important thing is to match the size of bait in the area but generally tailor are not that fussy

go and talk to the boys at Windsor Bait and Tackle and hop on thier youtube page and have a look at some of the fishing they do

100%- waste of time- recirc is the only way to go

give Lowrance a call- ive found them very helpful with this sort of stuff

Sabiki's- used to waste my time with bait but very rarely revert to it these days- I mainly get my livies in the harbour and in deeper water than a lot of folk would think (60-100ft), I sound up the schools and bomb them, also aggressively reverse back over the school so i can get the sabikis vertical, usually start the day before sun up which makes them bite better.Final point is i get far better results with the brand name sabikis than i do with the elcheapos- look for the ones with the pictures of yakkas and slimies on the pack. Those bomb sinkers are good though, I just tie a loop in the bottom of the Sabiki and loop them on . The main point i would make though is using your sounder to stay on the schools-its a rare morning these days if I spend more than 20 minutes filling the tank

Its the skipper, not the boat. a decent, well built tinnie will manage a run to the FADS in good weather- no probs- usually the roughest part of the journey is leaving the heads and coming back through anyway. Learn your boat, learn the weather (and that doestnt mean reading Seabreeze) and learn to read the sea and you should be fine. Take small steps at first, go on a nice day on the weekend , the FADS off Sydney are pretty close in anyway and on the weekend their will be heaps of punters hitting them so you wont be alone.

Read the NSW Regulations- Pipis are for bait only and may not be removed further than 50 meters from high tide line-thems the rules!