Re: Making a side console
That's some nice work, guys. Here's two images of a side console retrofit to my trusty old 1970 Springbok 14 footer. She was my runabout 35 odd years ago as a kid and is due her rightful resto for my own kid now. Hope to get started this summer.
Anyway, we attached a pre-fabbed, aluminum side console (sorry, can't remember who manufactured it) and just rivetted it to the side of the boat, ensuring the lowest rivet point was still above the waterline.
It was light enough that no other support was needed. The throttle control was screwed to an L-shaped piece of aluminum which was similarly rivetted to the side. Steering and control cables just run down the side, zip-tied to the oar lock and seat supports. None too pretty, but I can't imagine fabricating a box like that would be difficult.
A word of warning. This one has absolutely no access to the inside. I'm going to have to cut a hole in the back and make an access door should I ever need to get at the steering's innards. Or easier, drill out the rivets for the back panel and replace with screws. Not too much planning ahead there!
Also, now that I'm grown, I find the console too low, so you'd probably want to make sure it sits above the boat's gunwales, like txm's does. Just make sure to spend some time figuring out where the most comfortable steering wheel location is before afixing things permanently.
(When I was a kid, I'd actually sit on the floor of the boat, using the middle seat of the boat as a backrest and looking through the spokes of the wheel, a la classic woody. Oh, it was a cool rig and I spent many hundreds of hours dogfighting unaware seagulls in my trusty "speedboat" getting a blistering 10 knots out of that little 7.5 merc
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