I own a Ranger and I am not narrow minded. I like Skeeter too. Bullet and Allison are good for speed, but they aint no fishin boat IMO. Part of the reason they go so fast is because they are light. They are light because the hull is not as thick. The hull is not as tough, or so I am told by someone in the business.

The key here is that they are selling now for what they sold for new 20 years ago, not what a brand new one sells for. A brand new Allison hull will sell for much more than a 20 year old classic, regardless of condition.

I have fished out of Bullets for years with no issues. A thick hull is not necessarily strong, but it will be heavy. A well engineered, Kevlar reinforced hull should be strong and light. If thick hulls were the answer, Raycraft and Sidewinder would be the most popular boats on the market, if they weren't out of business.

LUND

"thick=strong" beat that into someone's head long enough and they will eventually believe it.

Reality is, nothing is further from the truth. "thick" is just cheap.

What is most of the weight in a fiberglass laminate? Resin. However resin by itself has very little strength, only when it's bonding two fibers of laminate together is it strong. A resin rich lay up (ranger) is not a bit stronger than a carefully worked light layup (Allison) even though it weighs almost twice as much.

Don't be such a lemming to believe every thing you hear at a boat show.

Like I said folks, I won't name names, but I have been told by someone that does fiberglass boat repair that the fast boat hulls are not as good. Don't shoot the messenger. Pat, I don't understand "Thick is Cheap". Don't hate, you know Ranger builds a good hull just like alot of other manufacturers. It depends on what you want. If you want a 100 MPH boat, you need a light boat. I know composites are strong, they came into the aviation industry years ago. I have alot of experience with composites. But take two hulls made out of the same material whether it be a composite or fiberglass, which hull would be stronger, the hull with 2 layers, or the hull with 4 layers?

Again,
Let's review composites, and how they are built.

You have layers of material, fiberglass, kevlar, Nytex, whatever. They lay there doing nothing until they have something to bond them together. The laminate material is actually very light weight, two, three, eight layers of material don't weigh much at all....until you add resin.

Resin is 80%+ the weight of the composite. It's ONLY purpose in life is to chemically bond the material together. Any excess beyond that is just weight, it has virtually no strength.

When you examine the actual layers of material between a ranger, and say an allison, you'll see they are identical. The difference is the amount of labor involved in removing and working out the excess resin. It takes time, a lot of time and effort to do this. But, the end result is a much more dense laminate, actually being stronger, than the resin-rich "standard" layup.

I don't know how you determine taking off the excess gives you a denser laminate. The excess has nothing to do with the laminated material, you said so yourself.

If you've ever watched a "Quality" boat being built, after the mat is saturated with resin, the glass man will take a roller (usually wood or plastic) and start rolling it across the mat to "squeegee" the excess resin into pools, which are then removed. This is time intensive, and most manufacturers don't spend too much time on it because of diminishing returns for the work involved. Companies like Bullet and Allison will spend 3 times as much effort on this step because they know that it will make the boat lighter and make the laminate marginally stronger. Again, there is a point where the payoff for the work involved drops considerably, and that is where most builders cut it off.

If you think that a 20' STV that weighs 700# is a flimsy piece of junk, you should do your homework. And the big boat builders like Fountain and Cigarette are obsessive about this step.

Back in the late 80's, I had a Tidecraft that got holes in it every spring. I switched to Champion after I learned that although the bottom had another layer of mat, it was lighter and the bottom was actually the same thickness as the Tidecraft. But it is 3 times as strong. I still have it.

Artie

Ok, maybe I'm not communicating as clear as I could be...

Here are facts on building a fiberglass laminate, let's agree on this first.

The "material" again, if it's roven woven, rag, nytex, kevlar, whatever is the strength of the laminate, ok?

The resin that holds it together does only that, bonds the layers of material to each other, ok?

Resin by itself has virtually NO strength, it can be broken easily without the glass material giving it strength, ok?

Labor is more than the materials when building a boat, so if I can save say, 30 hours of labor, that's less expense on the final product, ok?

When I remove as much excess resin as humanly possible, the end result is more laminate material, with less resin, which makes for a much more dense laminate, which also weighs less. Let's put this in numbers, maybe that's easier.

Chopper gun hull, 85% resin, 15% laminate.
Typical roven woven 22 oz hand lay up (ranger) 65% resin 35% laminate.
Tri-directional nytex and multi directional rag extreme hand lay up (allison) 70% laminate 30% resin.

It takes an average 50 man hours more labor to lay up an allison hull than it does the ranger, but the results are noticable. The hulls are denser, flex less, and can take a beating. Heavier is not necessarily stronger when it comes to fiberglass layups. It goes beyond logic if you've not been around it.

I'm not hating, just want people to understand marketing hype isn't always fact.

Marketing hype is rarely fact. Pat, are these numbers you give a fact,and if so, where do you get your info since Ranger will not give out this information?

I hear what you are saying Pat, and Technically I have no problem with it. However, would you agree that while heavier might not be stronger, it does equate to better ride in rough water conditions, due to not allowing as much air under the boat?
The reason that I say that is that I have a friend that has one of the "speed" hulls, that whenever the water gets just a little rough, will beat your kidneys to death. Now I also have to say that the passenger notices the ride worse than the driver, cause he has nothing like a steering wheel to grip, and the driver generally has a better view of what's oncoming. I've never ridden in an allison, bullet, or gambler, so I've no basis to compare to those 3. I have ridden in plenty of Blazers, Nitros, Hydrasports, Procrafts, Skeeters, Champions, Chargers, Rangers and Basscats, and all of the last 4 I mentioned have given pretty good rides in rough water.

Driver and hull design make way more difference in ride than just weight.

I could take you in my allison, and you'd be amazed at how well the ride was, if you took the wheel, (no slam intended) you'd think it was pretty bouncy.

The market now is for big wide heavy hulls, that the driver makes no input with, just point it at a wave and bash it. If that's all you know, then by all means a big heavy tub will serve you best. However with a little instruction, a hull that responds quicker and handles better will actually give you a much better ride, because it can react to your input. That's a different story though.

To answer the question on percentages and weight in hulls, it's pretty common knowledge among boat builders. You take the amount of resin used, vs laminate, and you'll have your number. Learn what advances are made in boat building, with vacuum bagging, no air processes, etc and you'll see the old open mold process is going the way of the dodo bird, as well it should.

I think Pat needs some help here with the good ole Ranger boys.

Here again, I like Rangers. I like Champions. I like BassCats. I like Tritons too. I have owned 3 Rangers, 3 BassCats, and three Tritons that were all good boats. I have owned two Allisons and bought my sixth Bullet back in Sept '06.

I buy a new boat every year. Some years more than one, so I am kinda like a walking Consumer Reports when it comes to bassboats. I do not claim to be a know it all about boats but I have owned and setup about three person's lifetimes worth of bassboats so I have some knowledge of these critters.

I will buy a "normal" bassboat and fish it for a year and then get the itch to go fast again. I just bought my sixth 20' Bullet with a "Comp" Hull. Last year I ran a 22' Triton with a 300 Yamaha. My buddy just bought a "Super Comp" Bullet that weighs 200# less than my Bullet due to being all Kevlar. When you open his deck lids, they are noticeably lighter than mine but have the same rigidity as mine. I mean they weigh half as much as mine! It is incredible. He did pay a $6K premium to have the all Kevlar boat. This stuff is not cheap.

Think about this: One of my best friends is a Dallas Cop. He wears his Kevlar vest all day everyday. It weighs about 4# and will stop a .357 slug at point blank range. If it were built using the same technology as most of the well-known brands of boats out there, it would weigh TWENTY!

Most of you that talk about the rough ride of a Bullet or an Allison have never even ridden in one much less driven one.

What Pat said about the layup process is dead on. It is not possible to make a chopper gun built boat like a BassCat, Ranger, or Champion as light as a truly handlaid hull. I recall seeing an old Ranger commercial where it showed a guy using the chopper gun spraying the mixture of resin and chopped fiberglass into a mold at the factory. Some of you may recall it too but didn't realize what you were seeing. Guys, this is not something I would advertise if I owned a boat manufacturing company! What is does, is makes a hull excessively heavy without gaining any strength. Guess why? Too much resin to fiberglass cloth ratio.

LET ME BE CLEAR! I AM NOT SAYING THAT THE USE OF A CHOPPER GUN MAKES IT A BAD BOAT! It is not a slam to say one company uses a chopper gun to layup their boats. It does cut the labor involved in building one by a significant margin, but it adds unnecesarry weight.

Another common misconception is that a boat that weighs more has to ride better. This is bunk too. Once again, the guy that says he is not narrow minded but his boat rides better even though he has only talked to someone that has ridden in one of the lightweight go fast boats, is NARROW MINDED!!

One more piece of trivia about "light go fast" boats. Would it make sense to ask someone that repairs them after they break what they thought of the different brands of boats? At one time, Alan Dunn of Triple A Fiberglass and Larry Boyd of Sun Valley Fiberglass, both owned Bullets. Call and ask them what they think of the different construction of all the boats they have torn apart and repaired. Alan was one of the primary reasons I first bought a Bullet back in '94.

That's my 2 cents worth for now.

Ken

Here's what I'm think Pat....Have you ever been on the roughest fresh water lake in the nation? That without a doubt would be the Lake of the Ozarks in the summer time after memorial day. You can't read the waves because they are coming from every direction. Running that lake in a bass boat is crazy because they allow unlimited size and unlimited horsepower, and no speed limit, so 40' Cigarette boats run however they want. Point being, that although Conroe is no Lake of the Ozarks, once the pleasure boaters come out in force around Easter, no amount of driver's skill is going to keep you from battling rough water. I think I would compare Rangers, Champions and Cats in this instance to Cadillacs, and Allisons, Bullets, and Gamblers to Corvettes. Which would you rather ride down a logging road at 50mph?