Glastron Molinari - Red / White Hull History
Scott -
The consumate "expert" on this hull would be me................
This boat was shipped back to Detroit MI from LakeBay WA many years ago after sitting in various backyards and weed patches for years. I'm the idiot who painted it red. Underneath, you will find the original yellow / black gel coat. I would advise against stripping it down because the boat took a beating by various owners who used it to chase and net herring schools in Puget Sound......to the point of putting sand embedded paint on the deck!Painting it to its original color scheme would be best. It's original owner (delivered as a new boat from Glastron) was Dick Sharp, who ran an Evinrude Strangler on the hull (1969?).Further, the cockpit sides were re-glassed higher (cut that stuff back) and the blip in the aft cowl was added to make a Mercury 1500XS look shorter. (grind that thing off!) I ran the boat 2-3 years in Sport J and held my own against shorter wood Sport J hulls. I shocked the local race OPC race club when I showed up to race something that they thought had ended up in the city dump. The "Glastron / Molinari" logos on the side are hand-scaled replicas of what I could find in the 1970 Glastron sales brochure at the time (vinyl computer generated graphics didn't exist....only commercial lithographs. I don't agree with the comments about the rockers. The sponsons were blueprinted with a straightedge and I could run that thing on its tail all day long (nose slant aligned level with the horizon) and I have old Kodak slides to prove it! The original drum / cable steering was cut out and replaced with Mercury break-away steering (new technology at the time). The boat never had a trim ram splash well. The hole thru the transom (T-1/2X?) for a trim ram is new to me. My 1500XS had externally mounted ski-boat style trim rams. That boat spent a period of time on the bottom of Lake Stevens after Sharp blew it over. I'm assuming that you got the hull from JE? Maybe for fun, I"ll take some digital photos of some large color photographs I have (running the boat in 1977) that are hanging in my den? From 1977 to 1984, that boat was garage-stored out of the daylight and weather.
Glastron Brochure - Circa 1970
Joe -
I have been wondering for 30 years where that famous shot was taken! That page of the Glastron brochure currently sits under framed museum quality glass in my office. Whatever became of the 2+2 recreational hull that was also in the brochure? Was the CT-15 considered a "different product" offered for sale in the brochure in comparison to the Glastron / Molinaris? Who was in the CT-15 shot (Twister powered).......someone told me that it was Dick Shearer.
Anyway, as a kid, I always wondered who those supermen were that got to drive those yellow dream machines! Now, I know who!
More About Album #38........
MN4V -
These videos pre-date my entry into racing by about 5 years. It kind of tugs @ my emotions because Dave Potter passed away this year from leukemia. Dick Sharp passed on several years ago. I would see Dave Potter again in 1986 when I blew over my SST120 Seebold (before safety cockpits were mandated by the APBA) while testing @ Lake Tapps WA. I broke my leg and finger (got caught in trim switch bracket as I was ejected from my seat) and they loaded me up in an ambulance. As I lay there on the gurney while a paramedics are taking my race gear off (and cutting up my brand new jumpsuit), I hear this chuckling coming from up in the driver's seat and it's Dave Potter at the wheel driving the ambulance........Dave is saying something like "way to go Tim"...who's drying the motor out?, etc.
TB