[CrappieDay]

I just had a rotten transom on my '89 Pro-V. Lund told me about 20 hours to fix it at $80/hr. That was just to replace the transom, that didn't include detaching and re-rigging the motor. I thought it would probably be close to $2000 with the transom, motor and transportation. I decided to tackle the job myself. There was a lady (can't remember her name) in Lund customer service that was very helpful at explaining what I had to do to replace the transom myself. It was a pretty big job, I should have logged my hours, but total I was probably around 50 or so. The hardest part of the whole job was getting the old wood out. It was rotten so I couldn't pull it out easily. I ended up using an 18" spade wood bit and chewing up a bunch of wood in the middle. Then I took a pry bar and pushed the wood from the end of the transom to the middle where there was a little more room and the wood could be pulled easily. I took a lot of time waterproofing my new wood and made sure I had a good sealant in the holes and around the heads of all the bolts. I've ran the boat quite a bit this year and several times in rough water. The transom is still rock solid. It took many weekends over the winter and I lost some spring fishing time, but I thought it was worth it. I really didn't want to put $2000 in that old of a boat, and I wasn't ready for a new one yet. Good luck in your decision. If you decide to do it yourself, I'll try to let you know some of the problems I ran into and how I got around them.