Mounting of Scotty Downriggers using Right Angle Mounts

[fishing eagle]

There has been discussions in the past about the mounting of downriggers on the gunwale of our Arima boats. Mounting the popular Scotty downrigger is a little tricky because from my experience the mounting base of a Scotty and the width of the gunwale are fairly close the same. When I tried to first mount my Scotty electric downriggers I found that trying to align and drill holes in my gunwale was near impossible because the mounting base holes would need me to drill through the edge of the fiberglass and into the web of the hull and very close to the edges of the gunwale and I was not happy with this decision or choice. I ended up going back to my Scotty dealer and purchasing the Scotty right angle mounting brackets. Yes the pair of them cost me almost $100 but in the end... it was all worth the added expense. The right angle mount has a base that mounts to the inside inwall of the gunwale by drilling four holes and the bolting the base to the boat. The other half of the angle mounting base is mounted directly to the standard swivel base mount of the Scotty DR. Then you just place the Scotty in place on the gunwale and use two quick-mount thumb screws to attach the two. The end result is seen in my photos and your Scotty DR still swivels 360 degrees and also can be lifted up and down. Nothing really changes in the operation of the downrigger except it is easily removed with two thumbscrews. I remove my DRs from the gunwale when it is on my trailer in storage and I want to put the sloping canvas cover in place. I just unbolt them and put them down on the deck while the boat is stored and it takes seconds to do so.

In the 3rd picture you can see the base plate behind the Scotty angle bracket and it is not too large or in the way when the downriggers are not mounted to the gunwale if you choose to remove them.

[rusty scuppers]

Hi Fishing eagle, I just bought a Arima Seahunter because there is no better 15 foot boat. I use to have a 17 seachaser with a 115hp merc which I would trust with my life ( got caught in a bad storm more than once) but it ate me alive in gas. I did have other boats in between including a catalina 22 sailboat which was real good on gas and I love to sail but the Admiral didn't care for the setting up all the time at the ramp. Anyway I bought some right angle mounts for my scotties too but had to make some tapered shims because the gunnel is not 90 degrees like the mounts. Are your gunnels 90 degrees?

[fishing eagle]

No wedges or shims were required for my right angle installation on my Sea Ranger.

[polarbill1999]

Me and my dad did something similar on our 16 Sea Chaser.  We ran into a couple hurldes that fishing eagle probably didn't because our flushmount pole holders are farther forward and we have grab rails that the previous owner installed.  Our inside gunwall was also shorter then fishing eagles so we needed to make up a support to go under the mount.  See this thread and pictures.

[urlhttp://arimaboatownersgroup.com/index.php?topic=261.0][/url]