BobbyMagee
05-29-2007, 10:34 PM
Hey...
First post around these parts....thought I'd share a bit about an old boat that we kind of saved from an estate house cleaning.
The boat was built by my friend's father and after his passing they family was going to cut the old girl up and truck it off.
I asked if maybe we could look into how bad of shape it is first and they were ok with it.
The father and son had repowered it and built a very heavy cabin on it and some new fuel tanks. Also two layers of glass over the 20 foot sheets of mahogony ply and a layer of glass inside. They put in a new floor and poured two part foam in the bilge cavities. After the mods it would no longer come up on step and was abandoned for 14 years.
When we looked at it the engine was siezed, the foam was waterlogged. We removed the cabin, pulled the floors and scraped out all the wet foam looking for the rot that surely must be there. Amazingly there was very little rot anywhere.
We squirted penetrating oil in the jugs and chased that after a few hours with some two stroke juice. Came back in a few days and over she turned. Pulled the valve covers and things looked good...no stuck valves and clean. Pulled the carb and the intake looked clean so rebuilt the carb.
Pretty crude looking old girl...24 foot open hull, no floor, no engine cover, stand up center console, 350 chev, hamilton 3 stage jet.
Well after a couple weeks work replacing all the removed manifold / block plugs, cleaning, tuning, etc. We took her to a local lake and after some timing woes she fired up, smoked like hell then settled down to a nice idle.
Pushed off the dock and fired it up. Put her in gear and idled around watching the temp for a while. The plan had been to let it run for a while then try to get her up on step.
It came up on step with no trouble and the next thing you know we're slinging all over the lake topping the run off with the better part of a Hamilton jet spin:eek: . Water everywhere coupled with huge grins! A friend clocked it at around 40 mph for a short run.
We shut it down for a while and one of the cylinders filled with water but I suspected this might happen as the manifolds were pretty nasty looking. Pulled the plugs, turned it over, put em back in and back to the dock no trouble.
Still alot of issues to mess with but all in all a good go so far. She planes, handles and seems solid enough to warrant repower and manifolds so now I have something to do with my disposable income...then I'll try to find more for the other manifold and engine..lol.
Anyway....hi all...
Jet boats are fun.
First post around these parts....thought I'd share a bit about an old boat that we kind of saved from an estate house cleaning.
The boat was built by my friend's father and after his passing they family was going to cut the old girl up and truck it off.
I asked if maybe we could look into how bad of shape it is first and they were ok with it.
The father and son had repowered it and built a very heavy cabin on it and some new fuel tanks. Also two layers of glass over the 20 foot sheets of mahogony ply and a layer of glass inside. They put in a new floor and poured two part foam in the bilge cavities. After the mods it would no longer come up on step and was abandoned for 14 years.
When we looked at it the engine was siezed, the foam was waterlogged. We removed the cabin, pulled the floors and scraped out all the wet foam looking for the rot that surely must be there. Amazingly there was very little rot anywhere.
We squirted penetrating oil in the jugs and chased that after a few hours with some two stroke juice. Came back in a few days and over she turned. Pulled the valve covers and things looked good...no stuck valves and clean. Pulled the carb and the intake looked clean so rebuilt the carb.
Pretty crude looking old girl...24 foot open hull, no floor, no engine cover, stand up center console, 350 chev, hamilton 3 stage jet.
Well after a couple weeks work replacing all the removed manifold / block plugs, cleaning, tuning, etc. We took her to a local lake and after some timing woes she fired up, smoked like hell then settled down to a nice idle.
Pushed off the dock and fired it up. Put her in gear and idled around watching the temp for a while. The plan had been to let it run for a while then try to get her up on step.
It came up on step with no trouble and the next thing you know we're slinging all over the lake topping the run off with the better part of a Hamilton jet spin:eek: . Water everywhere coupled with huge grins! A friend clocked it at around 40 mph for a short run.
We shut it down for a while and one of the cylinders filled with water but I suspected this might happen as the manifolds were pretty nasty looking. Pulled the plugs, turned it over, put em back in and back to the dock no trouble.
Still alot of issues to mess with but all in all a good go so far. She planes, handles and seems solid enough to warrant repower and manifolds so now I have something to do with my disposable income...then I'll try to find more for the other manifold and engine..lol.
Anyway....hi all...
Jet boats are fun.