otter sled mod–good idea or waste of time?

[Naturboy]

I’m not sure what down Jill skis are made of besides very dense wood but they are tuff. I’ve been using skis for this purpose for years and the only issue I’ve ever had was scraping up the bottom by pulling a sled across a road. Skis smooth bottoms don’t do we’ll on blacktop or gravel.

Spare the rod and you'll spoil the child
Take a kid fishing

[Tom Sawyer]

Paul I’m going to drop off a 2x4x8 today so yo can cut me two sets for my portables. My table saw is buried out in the garage; a garage thats much colder than yours too.

Looks like a great plan buddy

[Loopy]

I wish somebody made a rack that mouts on the top edge of these things so you could put buckets and such in the sled and put the fish house auger up on top of the rack, am actually thinking about buying a wire welder and trying to fab something up myself.

[600twin]

I used to have skis mounted on an old pallet and then set my old clam5600 on top of that. Pulled really nice. Just take the fish house off the pallet to set it up. Drilling thru the skis is not big deal. Just countersink the screws a little and you’ll be set.

[Tharemy]

mward_350 wrote:

walleyejack wrote:
man I still would rather not drill thru the skis do you think liquid nails would be adequate?

Again, glue will not work. You’re trying to bond two surfaces that are too dissimilar in composition. Throw in subzero temps and that bond will fail the first time you hit a bump. Use screws. Trust me, the ski is more than strong enough to withstand a few small holes through the bottom. If it breaks, you can go to the thrift store and buy another pair for $3.00.

I agree with MWard. I made a sled for hauling my gear (I have a hub). The base of the sled I mounted on down-hill skis. I drilled holes through the skis using a small drill bit just big enough for the screw to go through. Then, a larger hole with a larger bit, but only barely into the surface of the ski. Then I used flat-head screws and counter-sank them just barely.

Trust me, you don’t lose the slickness of the ski, it pulls just fine.

I have have the skis only 4″ off the snow, and it pulls like a dream. Deep snow gets sketchy, but it still pulls fine. I pull it side by side against an otter sled and it’s a huge difference.

Also agree with longer rope, although with mine I find myself putting my auger in at an angle so the handles stick up out the back. Then I lean on the auger and push the sled. I found that to work a lot better in deeper snow because you can lean a bit of your weight on the handles and it pushes the sled forward because it’s at an angle.

[Nickc]

I agree with a few other guys on here. Liquid nails/glue will not work. I made a sled a few years ago with old downhill skis I bought from the goodwill for either $3 or $6. I took the bindings off, cut about a foot off the skis using a 4″ hand grinder and counter sunk screws about every 6″ in the center of the skis. I then stood a 2×6 on edge and screwed that to the skis. After that I just put a piece of plywood across connecting the skis. I think that was about 2’x4′. it slid just fine with a probably a dozen holes in each ski. And they were fiberglass skis.

[Author]

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