21' Chieftain Project

[Justatech]

Hello,
I have been following this forum for a while and figured it was about time for me to chime in with some pictures of my project. I will probably have a bunch of stupid questions to ask you guys as the process moves along. I found this Chieftain-V almost 1000 miles away from Portland, OR down in Nipomo, CA so we went down and picked it up over a long weekend. My plans are to get it back on the water this summer then continue to make it look nice over the winter. In the mean time it won't be as pretty as your boats are but it should do the trick for some fishing on the river or the Puget Sound. The transom seems pretty solid so I am going to try to get away with putting that off until the winter. So far I have the inside gutted and cleaned out I am going to sand and prep the inside for gluv it this weekend. I am ordering a belly tank to install and would like to be rebuilding in a few weeks. Anyway here are a few pictures.


A picture with the boat and Shasta on one of our many fuel stops on the way home.

The old bad flooring.


Shes a dirty girl.


Big pile of old foam

Cleaned up a bit

 

[hayko1971]

Looking good, you got it cleaned out well

 

[jbcurt00]

From where it is now, not a whole lot extra to do to be able to replace the transom

Once you start putting stuff back, it'll only get harder to replace. Once you start fishing out of it, it'll even be harder to tear it down to replace it.

Read thru some topics and see what's hidden behind the transom plywood that 'seemed' solid.

Nice shot of Shasta and a great looking Chieftain

What year Chieftain?

Good luck with your project. After Rob won the SOTY 2014, I thought that had been the year of the Chieftain. 2015 is shaping up to have even more Chieftains put back in service.

 

[Justatech]

From where it is now, not a whole lot extra to do to be able to replace the transom

Once you start putting stuff back, it'll only get harder to replace. Once you start fishing out of it, it'll even be harder to tear it down to replace it.

Read thru some topics and see what's hidden behind the transom plywood that 'seemed' solid.

Nice shot of Shasta and a great looking Chieftain

What year Chieftain?

Good luck with your project. After Rob won the SOTY 2014, I thought that had been the year of the Chieftain. 2015 is shaping up to have even more Chieftains put back in service.

Yes you are right doing it now is probably best I really want to get her out on the water. But I have been on the fence because I really would like the peace of mind of just having it done. Thanks for chiming in on that side I think I will do it... It won't really take that much longer, what's another couple weekends?
The paperwork says its a 1974 but there is a registration sticker for 1972 on it so I think it might be an earlier model.

 

[laurentide]

Yeah, it looks like you're most of the way through a total gut job on the way to a rebuild. You can worry about paint and stuff later, but you'll have all the hard work done in order to get it back on the water. I'll echo jb's suggestion to just do the transom now.

Where will you be using the boat? You can go just about anywhere (lakes, rivers, ocean) in that big old Chief. Great rig!

 

[dozerII]

:welcome: Justatech, great looking Chief you have there, and you have ripped into the guts pretty quick. I agree with jb, now's the time to get at the transom. On the right rear corner of the transom just under the corner cap is the HIN tag the last two digits will be the year. If there is no tag and no holes where it could have been riveted on it is prior to 72.

 

[classiccat]

Welcome to the Starmada JaT! :welcome:

Somedays the Chief is my favorite SC model ....other days are shared between the spiffy Nova, versatile SS and the ultra-practical Holiday :lol:

 

[GA_Boater]

Welcome to the Tin Drydock, Justa. What Mercruiser is in the back? Good start rippin' the guts out.

You only have a couple of inches of wood in the stern and then you won't have to rip her up over the winter. Just add improvements to make her better while you dream about next spring and getting in a full season.

Boy, it used to be SuperSports were a dime a dozen in here, now it's Chieftains.

 

[Watermann]

Welcome to the Starmada, it's awesome to see another Chief being restored and given a second chance at life on the water! Great start to the restoration process so far. :thumb:

Your not going to find a better place to get info on SCs and the Chiefs have become super popular lately. Your's looks to be in great shape under all that nasty. I see in your pics that the factory left some steel rivet mandrels behind for you as well. (long rust spots). Be sure check her out real closely on the rib ends for any signs of cracking, it's very common with this era of SC.

I would most definitely replace that transom and you'll be thankful you did when you see what's behind the breaking down 40 year old ply.

 

[Tnstratofam]

:welcome: to the tinsanity! That is a great start to a nice looking Chief. I think you're making the right choice replacing the transom while you've got the deck ripped out. Like has been said already it is much easier now with everything out of the way, and it's only a couple more days work. I agree this may be the year of the Chiefs as far as restos go. Looking forward to seeing her brought back to life.

 

[Decker83]

Real nice looking Chief you have.. Made a great start on tear down..
Would like to come aboard and follow along..

 

[home-boy]

Don't throw that old floor away! At a minimum use it as a template to cut your new wood.

 

[Justatech]

Thanks for all the welcomes and words of advice guys. I still haven't figured out the multi quote so I will answer the questions without quoting.

Chemical wire- I plan to use the boat mostly here on the Columbia and also up on the Puget Sound pretty regularly as well. Once it is all setup the way I want I'm sure some ocean days are in the future as well.

Dozer- Thanks for the info! I was helping my dad with his prop shaft alignment on his sailboat today but tomorrow I will work on my boat and check for the HIN and see if I can find out what year the boat is.

GA Boater- it is a mercruiser 165 which worked out great because I actually have a spare 165 sitting around I picked up in coos bay for super cheap for another project. So between the two I should have everything I need to get her running good. I have a spare outdrive also come to think of it but it is in unknown condition.
Since I have decided to do the transom I am going to get the mechanics sorted out this week and make sure I can get the motor in her now working. Having it out to do the transom anyway seems like the best time to deal with a swap if need be, I want to hoist engines up as few times as possible. Seeing all that motor up in the air always creeps me out. I guess I would be a bad crane operator.

Waterman- Thanks for the info I looked at the rib ends and didn't see any cracking when we cleaned inside. I'm sure I will have plenty if time to get up close and personal and look real close when I'm wire wheeling and sanding in there to clean it all up.

Home-boy- Don't worry I am definitely going to use that old deck as a template, might have to use a little creativity on the badly rotted out sections though!

 

[jbcurt00]

Click quote under a post you want to reply/answer too.. A reply window opens w the quoted text. Scroll back up to the top of the topic. Notice at the top left of the list of replies, just under the topic title or above your user name there is a Post Reply button.

Then scroll thru the list of replies, and click quote for each additinal reply you want to quote.

Once yoy've clicked all you want to quote, scroll back up to the post reply button snd notice its changed colors and now has a number after it. Click that Post Reply button. The number should match the total # of replies you want to quote.

A reply window will open that has all the quotes you wanted to answer. Just fill un between them w your replies.

 

[GA_Boater]

A good plan to get the 165 fired up before pulling her out. Then you know it was running before the transom is finished and ready to fire her up again. My couple of pennies.

 

[Watermann]

I have a good feeling about your ole mustard Chief and how she's going to turn out. I love to see motivated guys tear into these old classic hunks of tin. Our man Dozer is the most highly motivated tin man that I've ever seen and keeping up the forward progress is the key. So many guys reach the point between the tear down/clean up and the restoration then just disappear. Having a place to work out of the elements is vital and it looks like you have a nice covered area to work in.

The MC 165 is a great motor and quite the workhorse, getting it running should be pretty darn easy if you remember how to work on point type ignitions. Personally I wanted to forget all about them and went newer to the Thunderbolt ignition. If the spare OD you have came off a 165 then you should be good but to be sure check the numbers on it to make sure the gear ratio matches up to the 165.

The small crack I had at the rib ends were only visible on the outside (bottom)once I stripped the paint off the bottom and closely inspected each rivet. (used a magnifying glass with an LED). The close up pic below is what you're looking for and my Chief was in the turtle position when I was inspecting it. Without intervention those types of cracks will continue to grow.

 

[Grandad]

The small crack I had at the rib ends were only visible on the outside (bottom)once I stripped the paint off the bottom and closely inspected each rivet. (used a magnifying glass with an LED). The close up pic below is what you're looking for and my Chief was in the turtle position when I was inspecting it. Without intervention those types of cracks will continue to grow

... until they look like this!

 

[classiccat]

Since we are showing off our cracks :lol:

 

[Justatech]

Thanks for the pointers in the right direction to look for issues. I inspected all of the rib ends carefully today and saw no evidence of cracking. When we were cleaning it out I had quite a bit of water in there my GF crawled under the trailer and checked for leaks and there didnt appear to be any so I feel pretty good about how this hull was treated in the past. Today I went over the motor and things did not look good. it was full of water and has been parked for 10 years. everything is rusted up on the inside. Checked into my spare motor and it looks real nice no rust in the exhaust manifold or anything. It is actually an OMC 165 not a mercuiser but it is the same GM 250 so as long as I use the bell housing off the current engine I understand it should just swap right in. I am going to work on getting it running in the garage before I do the transom and pull the current motor. The big upside of today is I went to pull the outdrive and expected it to be terrible. I have done this once before and it took the better part of the day and a few hands. I pulled this one myself in 5 minutes and the ujoint thing looks to be in really good shape, I am of course going to do gimble bearing and bellows but I was very happy to see how greased and well maintained the outdrive looked. The little bits of good news really help keep morale up on a big project like this.
edit- watermann, I forgot to mention on looking into the mechanicals I did find this thing has a cdi setup so hopefully it works and I can use that. I am not real familiar with them but I am going to brush up and hopefully put it to use.

 

[dozerII]

Too bad about the Mercruiser, hopefully the OMC turns out good.