I need more information on my Cobra

[poison]

Hello' Everyone from Scream and Fly. I bought this boat off a guy for $500. He said it was a 1969 Cobra, it has a 89 Yamaha 90h and moves about 50mph. Fast' but come on I need more:reddevil:. the motor runs grea, it fires up first try. But I cant seem to find any info on this type of boat? Year, where it was made, and can i put a bigger motor on it :)239064 please help.

[FUJIMO]

Built in 1969(duh), made in Canada, yes...you can put a larger motor on it. :smiletest:

[T2x]

Transom lines clearly indicate that it is a derivative of the 16' Glastron from the mid 60's which was "popped" by damn near everybody. The decklines are reminiscent of Sidewinder, who also copied Glastron, so my guess is this is a 2nd generation copy of a Glastron by way of Sidewinder. I concur that it can handle more HP as I raced a 16 Glastron with dual inline 100 horse Mercs in 1965 and it handled that easily.

T2x

[Watermark]

T2x and Fujimo - You are spot on.

Sidewinder:
A Brief History
By Dan Milford - April 6, 2004

The Sidewinder trademark (for boats) was filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on January 6, 1969, under the name of Los Altos Marine Incorporated, located at 4898 El Camino Real, Los Altos, California. In their 1969 model full colour brochure, Sidewinder Boats claimed to be the world's largest designer/producer of V-bottom ski boats, with manufacturing facilities in California and Canada. Built for speed, Sidewinders were designed for the ultimate in racing, skiing, and personal pleasure. World record holder, Ken Baker, had designed two high performance hulls - the famous V bottom and the new tunnel. These hulls were multi-laminated and assembled by hand. Variety and choice were the order of the day with standard and deluxe versions, thirty-two colour combinations, and power plants from outboard through inboard-outboard and jet available. Appointed with choices of metalflake trim, racing stripes, tuck and roll wrap around vinyl seating, and colour keyed all weather carpeting, these stylish, powerful, and manoeuvrable boats turned heads at many a beach. (In fact they still do!)

Models available in 1969 were the V- bottom, low profile (Lo Pro) designs in 16 and 18 ft. lengths. Both could be had in the Deluxe version (16 ft. at 750 lb. and 18 ft. at 900 lb.) or the "stripped down" (100 lb. lighter) Standard versions. They could be had in outboard (135 hp max for the16 and 150 hp max for the 18), inboard/outboard (140 hp max for the 16 and 225 hp max for the 18) or jet drive (350 hp max for the 16 and 500 hp max for the 18 - although text in the brochure claims up to 600 horsepower was available!) Engines up to 455 cu. in. could be had. The tunnel model version, used predominately for racing, was available in either a 15 ft. or 17 ft. length, and could be custom built for single, double and triple outboard engine classes.

The revolutionary Super Sidewinder 16/18 ft. design was filed for a patent (by Ken Baker and Ronald Plescia) in the US on October 17, 1969 and granted patent on November 3, 1970 (Patent Number 219,118). Subsequent patent designs were filed and granted for the 14 ft. Super, XL deep-vee, and XL Tri-hull.

In 1970, Sidewinder relocated from Los Altos, up the road to 3545 El Camino Real, Palo Alto. In 1970 and '71 boats were also manufactured in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Meanwhile Sidewinders were being manufactured under the Cobra name, by California Fiberglass Limited in British Columbia, Canada.

In 1971, Ken Baker, president of Sidewinder Marine, Inc. in Palo Alto, California was in litigation over a lawsuit filed by Sidewinder Marine against twenty manufacturers, who had copied the revolutionary Super Sidewinder design, first produced in 1970. Imitators included Marlin, Tahiti, Wriedt, and Taylor. In 1971/72 production moved from Palo Alto to Anderson, CA. and by July 1972, at least four manufacturers had admitted infringement on the Sidewinder design patents. About 1971 Canadian Sidewinder production moved to Ontario, where, by 1972, they were manufactured as Sidewinders - not Cobras, by California Glass Marine.

In 1974 the Thompson Boat Company purchased manufacturing rights for Sidewinder boats and continued to manufacture them under the Sidewinder banner at Peshtigo, Wisconsin. Later Sidewinders (by this time only the 16 and 18 ft. Super models) were built by Thompson in St. Charles, Michigan and finally in Swan Creek, Michigan.

In Canada the last Sidewinders were made in the late 1980's and California Glass Marine folded in the early '90's. The last US Sidewinder (the 18SS) appeared in the 1990 Thompson Boat Company brochure. Thompson met its demise in September 2002, when the assets were sold in a liquidation auction.


Transom lines clearly indicate that it is a derivative of the 16' Glastron from the mid 60's which was "popped" by damn near everybody. The decklines are reminiscent of Sidewinder, who also copied Glastron, so my guess is this is a 2nd generation copy of a Glastron by way of Sidewinder. I concur that it can handle more HP as I raced a 16 Glastron with dual inline 100 horse Mercs in 1965 and it handled that easily.

T2x

[poison]

Thanks everyone. Wow that was great detail about my boat. I'm going to do a bunch of work on it over the winter I'll keep you all informed on the progress. In the mean time time to fly.Thanks again.

[T2x]

The sad thing here is that Sidewinder was granted a patent on a boat that included a bottom designed by Glastron. In those days if you changed a couple of dimensions your "design" was considered "unique" and the deck and sheer line on the Sidewinder would probably have passed that litmus test. This may still be the case as it appears that a couple of major Offshore Cat builders have lifted designs from Skater and Mike Peters freely. Truth is, it probably isn't worth the legal fees to fight these battles from a pure business investment perspective.

[poison]

Are there any books or scimatics that I could read up on? Possibly to convert the boat to a jet with a V8

[Mark75H]

Just buy a used jet boat ... there are plenty of guys with them that are either too old to drive them or can't afford the gas for them. Your boat is not a good candidate even if the parts were readily available

[poison]

A bigger motor it is. A fellow told member told me that the largest size motor I could run is a 135. For a 16'. But my boat is 14.5'. I would like to find some actual literature? Or if someone was crazy enough to put maybe a 150h. Or even better a 200h, on this type of boat. And if they could tell how it performed?

[Mark75H]

140-150 is probably all you can use on a boat like this. When V-6's came out, this style boat fell out of favor vs boats made for more power and able to use it vs just carrying it around on the transom like a trophy.

[CVX20SPRINT]

Check out www.sidewinder-boats.com (http://www.sidewinder-boats.com)
They should have all the info that you need.

[baldad45]

I've ran a inline merc 150 for years on this hull no problems. Presently I'm running a T2 , a shortshaft will handle better at plus 50 with less chinewalking.