Starcraft 1436 Jon Boats For Sale

The Starcraft 1436 jon boat is a 14-foot riveted aluminum hull with a 36-inch-wide flat bottom, sized for one to three people who want a simple, low-cost way to fish skinny water. The bare hull is light enough to handle alone, around 135 pounds, with a front deck adding roughly 60 pounds and a floor about 15 pounds. As boats go, a 1436 is inexpensive: a brand-new riveted jon boat in this class runs around $1,000, and used examples sometimes turn up for a couple hundred dollars, which is part of what makes Starcraft jon boats for sale appealing to first-time buyers. It tows easily behind a small vehicle such as a four-cylinder Subaru Forester, and the narrow trailer fits a single-car driveway.

Power on a 1436 jon boat tops out at a 15-horsepower outboard, the maximum rating for the hull. With that motor and a solo load, top speed lands in the low to mid 20s, commonly 23 to 24 mph and as high as 25 or 26 in ideal conditions. Add a second adult and that drops to roughly 21 to 23 mph. With the 15-horse rating, there is just enough power to pull a child on a tube or knee board, though it won't tow adults at speed.

The flat bottom is the defining trait of the Starcraft 1436 jon boat. It lets the hull run in less than a foot of water when paddled, with the engine tilted up to keep the prop off the bottom, and its narrow beam reaches places wider boats can't, including tight trout rivers. The trade-off is rough handling on open water: the flat bottom and 36-inch width slap and shift in waves rather than cutting through them, so big, choppy lakes are uncomfortable and less safe.

Stability depends on where you stand. In the bottom of the hull, the boat is solid enough that two people can stand and fish, and the hull will carry 400 to 500 pounds of people and gear when conditions are calm. Standing up on a casting deck or on a seat raises your center of gravity and makes the narrow hull tippy, and a side wake hitting the rail can put water over the gunnel. With two anglers aboard, moving fore and aft is awkward because there is little room to pass each other.

Because these are riveted jon boats, the rivets themselves can weep over time, especially after hitting stumps in shallow water, and many factory warranties cover the aluminum and welds but not the rivets. Owners commonly mod the 1436, adding a casting deck, pedestal seats on reinforced mounts, pour-in or sheet foam for buoyancy, vented flooring, rod storage, a bow-mounted Minn Kota trolling motor, a fish finder and lithium house batteries. The stock hull carries only a couple of OEM ribs, so added flooring usually means installing more support tubes. For a buyer, the boat is low maintenance and forgiving of light dents, but check for loose rivets, transom condition and whether a trailer is included, since some sell cheap precisely because they come without one.