Homemade Planer Boards & Mast

[muskybob]

Thought I'd share a homemade Planer Board set-up for anyone interested.

The mast is made out of a galvanized fence post I got from Home Depot. I got the pulleys there too. I made the reels out of empty electric wire spools with 6" bolts for handles. The post fit exactly into the seat pedestal mount in the bow of my 16' Starcraft Fisherman when I had it. The whole thing cost me less than $40. Have fun...

 

 

[W.W.IV.]

You did a wonderful job musky but I would have used milk cans for line winders on that fence post.

[muskybob]

Dang, never thought of that.

[on the lam]

Hey Bob, what kind of wood did u use for the boards... I used those plans with cedar and they have held up well, maybe 8 years now.

BTW, I would have mounted two beer can holders below the reels on the mast

[muskybob]

Hey Bob, what kind of wood did u use for the boards... I used those plans with cedar and they have held up well, maybe 8 years now.

BTW, I would have mounted two beer can holders below the reels on the mast

Just plain ol pine Pete. Painted them with outdoor enamel & no problems so far, knock on wood.

[on the lam]

[FISHBANDIT]

I used these same plans last year or the year before ,I just cut the boards (pine) little shorter then the plans called for. Used left over house paint as primer then sprayed a couple coats of glossy orange spray paint on them. They track great.

[Jimmyi]

Thought I'd share my homemade Planer Board set-up for anyone interested.

The mast is made out of a galvanized fence post I got from Home Depot. I got the pulleys there too. I made the reels out of empty electric wire spools with 6" bolts for handles. The post fit exactly into the seat pedestal mount in the bow of my 16' Starcraft Fisherman when I had it. The whole thing cost me less than $40. Have fun...

You did a great job. It looks like the one I made this winter. I havn't tried mine out yet. I have a question. How do you keep the spools tight or stopped so that you don't have more line going out that you don't want?

[muskybob]

You did a great job. It looks like the one I made this winter. I havn't tried mine out yet. I have a question. How do you keep the spools tight or stopped so that you don't have more line going out that you don't want?

I slide a bolt from the inside of one spool to the other. The bolt hits the mast & stops the spools from turning.

[ray koziatek]

[Trap Jaw]

I made a set of boards in the same way, but I made mine colapsable. If I get a chance I will put up some pics.

[TrophySeeker]

If anyone is interested I could post how I upgraded my (2) BigJon Planer Reels to Electric retrieve for ~$50 each.

Let me know.

[L&M]

I'm interested to see it.

[TrophySeeker]

O-k, I will take some pictures this week and create a new topic.

[muskybob]

Feel free to post it here Jim, it's a sticky and will help guys who might want to upgrade their store bought or homemade masts.

[TrophySeeker]

O-k, here are some pictures and descriptions of how I upgraded my BigJon manual planer reels to electric. Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures when I put these together, so the finished product pictures will have to do. This upgrade cost me around $50 each. Most of the cost was in the motors. I already had most of the other components including aluminum, SS u-bolts, and other misc. hardware.

Here is a picture of the finished product, starboard side.

This is the link to the motors I purchased and a pic from their site. I used Microsoft Live Cashback when I purchased, which was at 15% at the time. I chose the cheaper shipping and received in 2 days!

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 0367360046

These are the planer reel parts dis-assembled. The BigJon assembly is really just a 1/2-20 (fine thread) bolt with a 3/16 hole in it for a pin that the clutch assembly rides on. You can see how the clutch plate fits over the pin in the bottom of this photo.

So the bolts I purchased are 1/2-20 x 3" bolts from Lowes. Home Depot did not have them. I didn't want to destroy the original parts in case this didn't work out. To fasten the new bolt to the shaft of the motor, I drilled a 25/64" hole (didn't have a 10mm drill bit) through the center of the head of the bolt down through the shaft of bolt. This would be easier on a lathe, but I don't have one, so I used my drill press. It is very important that the hole be centered! I center punched and started with a 1/8" bit and moved up from there. You have to drill pretty deep, probably about an inch. After test fitting I drilled and tapped the side of the head of the bolt for a 1/4-20 setscrew. I had these. If I had to buy I would have tapped for 1/4-28. I also used a 3/16" drill to "dimple" the flat of the motor shaft so the setscrew would bite and not allow the new shaft to fall off (that would suck). You should be able to see what I am talking about in the picture below:

The other thing you will notice from my pictures is that the motor is all black, unlike the picture on e-bay. When I received the motors I removed the access cover for the worm gear and sealed with caulk. I also sealed around the motor body and around the wiring. Then I painted the motor with Plasti-Dip spray paint in hopes to completely waterproof. Time will tell. There are 2 holes in the bottom of the motor which I left open. Here is a picture of the backside of the starboard and port reels showing the sealed and painted motors:

I used a piece of 1/2" x 3/4" x 4" piece of aluminum to mount the line guide. I don't have many metal working tools, but you would be surprised that you can work with aluminum with woodworking tools if you go slow and are cautious. This piece was cut out of a much larger piece on my radial arm saw in multiple passes. The 4" wide aluminum that the motor is mounted to was cut on my table saw. carbide tipped blades really help. PLEASE BE CAREFUL!

You can also see that there is a left/right hand version. Since the motors are the same you will notice some differences in mounting. Also, the motors run in opposite directions to retrieve. This is one of the reasons I selected this motor. The wiring was pretty simple. I only use the motor for retrieve, and just loosen the clutch to let line out. This was part of the design so that if this didn't work out for some reason I could still use in manual. The mounting plates I used have a right angle bend in them, so I mounted the switches there. I bought (2) 2" x 4" x 1" deep plastic boxes at Radio Shack along with switches for under $10. You can see the wiring in the picture below. I have each of these fused at 5 amps.

All in all I'm pretty happy with these. They don't slow down at all retrieving my Otter Boats. I'm sure they would handle double skis without a problem. Not sure about those triples in the last GLA magazine though - but there is always manual retrieve.

This was a pretty easy project that most anyone can do. I hope this helps if you ever thought about buying electrics. For me it is just the convenience of the power retrieve, as I fish alone often and that frees me up to set lines, etc.

Feel free to ask questions.

[muskybob]

Nice neat job Jim. Thanks for the pics & full description.

[L&M]

Jim: Very neat & professionally done.

Thanks for the tip on the motor too. I can see a few other uses for it aswell.

[W.W.IV.]

That's an outstanding job, and it looks to me like you put a lot of thought into it. Nice work.

[W.W.IV.]

Hey MuskyBob ,that looks a lot better that the fence post and milk cans.

[muskybob]

Hey MuskyBob ,that looks a lot better that the fence post and milk cans.

Don't care much how it looks as long as it works. Anyone at the KOTL bash will tell you that :D

[TrophySeeker]

Just a quick update for those interested. These motors are rated for 60 watts, and draw around 5 amps. The 5 amp fuses proved to be a little too close, as I popped one bringing in a board in the 3 footers yesterday. You probably need 7-10 amp fuses.

[bobmsr]

i also made my own usedpressure treated pine coated with polyurathaneto seal them , the mastwasmade out of aluminum tubing the reels utilized aluminum for the handles and side plates abs was used for the spools made it all in work in the machine shop during lunch breaks

[bouks]

thanks Muskie bob for concidering new guys to the sport as I am in your 'tricks of the trade' If you read my introduction you'll know that I'm usally on my own really just getting into the sport. I'm currently at the point where I'm playing around with dipsy divers and doing quite well. I think I'd really like to play around with at least one planer board and I think your makeship mast is just what I should do since It's taking me forever to afford a second downrigger on my 17.5 princecraft. I had thought about building a mast similar to your's and on the board seat mount is a perfect place. One thing I'm wondering is with the mast in the holder did you find the need to have any side supports on the mast, kind of like a tripod setup or was the seat mount/mast strong enough on it's own. thanks again.

enjoy the water....bouks

[muskybob]

bouks, the mount seemed to do well without any side supports for the mast. Good luck on your project & thanks for the kudos.