Actually only took a couple hours to remove the springs and brackets, then an hour or so to run up to a great trailer parts place in Ellerton, Sturdy Built. The guy helping us took one look at all the broken/rusty/crappy parts in the back of the Explorer, took one measurement, and went in and pulled every spring, bracket, bolt, plate and u-bolt we needed. Damn it was sweet.
Then we went back and put everything together in an hour or so, no problems. ready to remove the blocks it was on, hook it up, wire the trailer lights, and hit the road.....
Nope, took the blocks out of the rear and the trailer tongue went to the moon! Only thing that stopped it was the skeg and prop hitting the dirt......
After we both pushed down on it, we figured it had about a negative 300 lbs tongue weight!!!!! I was f'n pissed!
So then, after looking stupid and trying to figure out what the F' to do, decided to try to jack the boat up off the trailer and see if we could slide it forward. Whoever put it on the trailer did not slide it forward up to the bow brace. It had about a foot of room to go forward.
So, after a bunch of jacking over and over, swearing, pushing, and pulling with the strap, we moved it forward to the brace. It then had about zero tongue weight.
So, we stacked concrete blocks and an old heavy ass piece of broken concrete on the bow of the boat and hit the road. (After wiring the lights). Wasted at least two hours doing all of this BS. It would have been a lot quicker if Bobcat hadn't refused to ride on the bow of the boat all the way home.
So, we decided to not go on the freeway, cause who knew how bad the tires were. We hit the road, and actually got to a road where the speed limit was 55. We got up to just over 45 and the trailer started shaking and jumping so bad we were sure it was a flat, but nooooooooo, no isue there. After wiggling the tires we decided it was a loose bearing. So, lets take back roads all the way from Bradenton to Port Charlotte.
It actually towed okay up to 43 MPH, anything more than that and the vibration would go nuts. So that was max speed. What would be a normal 1:15 drive became an over two hour ordeal. It made us nervous because of the 25 lbs of toungue weight or so, every bump it sounded like the trailer was gonna release from the hitch. But, we saw a lot of places we'd never been before, and will hopefully never see again.....
Anyway, we made it. I'll have to move the crank bracket further forward, cut the welds on the bow bracket and move it forward, then move the boat forward another foot or so to get the proper bow weight. (Bobcat couldn't guess at the exact amount needed because he'd had no beer for the entire day). The trailer tongue is plenty long.
Now to get the motor running, trimming, and tilting........