My 1972 Steury

I received a 1972 Steury 15? 415c with a 1971 Evinrude 40hp motor for my 19th birthday. I was looking for a boat that needed a new interior but ran and floated just fine. When we hooked the trailer up to the truck to take the boat home we noticed that the trailer harness was severed (also was missing a taillight). We didn?t dare plug it in because we were afraid of blowing the trucks fuses. Anyway, as we were driving home in the rain we saw that we were being tailed by a cop which was freaking us out (had past expirances with cops and trailer lights (not fun)). Turns out he had ?bigger fish to fry? and turned off the road. We got it home without any problems.

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The day after getting the boat, I noticed small cracks between the seats that weren?t there before. The fiberglass floor had leaked and had expanded the ?? plywood floor resulting in cracked fiberglass. On one hot day in May, I decided to start working on the floor. I wore a facemask and face shield and started cutting out the floor with a dremel. It wasn?t fast enough so I moved to a angle grinder. It was about 80 or 90 degrees outside that day so I took off my shirt while I was cutting. Bad Idea! The fiberglass dust stuck to me and that was the most painful week for me. After I cut, Alex and I vacuumed and swept up all the rotting wood and fiberglass pieces. For some reason I found this puddle in the corner of the stern. Don?t know where it came from. Probably from the rain.

Re: My 1972 Steury







I was debating between treated plywood or this new board that?s made out of some sort of plastic. The plywood is $20 and adds 10 pounds with the possibility of rotting in the future or this plastic wood that?s $10 and 20 pounds per board and I would need 8 boards but it would never rot. I decided to go with the plywood due to weight restrictions. After I bought the boards, the next day they had bowed severely on me. To fix the problem I cut the boards so that they would be fit in pieces. Also I screwed in reinforcement treated boards along the bottom to straighten out the plywood. I didn?t screw the floor down because I was afraid that the boards would still be too bowed to hold in place and rip out of the center stringer which wasn?t in the best of shape. Another reason that I kept them loose is that if I ever have to work under the floor, I just lift it up, do what is needed to be done, and replace. In the picture is a 2x2 to help hold the accessories in place especially during transit but it never got reinstalled after carpeting.

Re: My 1972 Steury

Welcome to iboats. First thing we gotta do it get your picture posting straightened out. Attaching pics right on iboats is a pain and the file size restrictions are too small. What most of us are doing is creating an account on a free image hosting site like photobucket.com, uploading our images, and linking to them from there. (size them to 640x480). There are a couple instructional threads about it in the non-boating technical section of this forum. Good luck with you project.

Re: My 1972 Steury



I bought some carpet and glue from Cabela?s online and when it arrived, it wasn?t what I had expected. Online the carpet color was ?Sage? which is a green that would match perfectly with the color. When I got it, it was Teal or a bluish green and the glue had busted open and had gotten some glue on the back of the carpet. I called Cabela?s and they were nice enough to send me another gallon of glue at no charge. Great customer service. My mom basically did the entire carpet install because for some reason I was having a difficult time with this new, thicker, marine-grade carpet. It looks pretty good. I also got new seats from Cabela?s. They fold out so you can lay on them. They are a little taller than the old ones but they work and look great. I also got a battery box, cb radio, remote spotlight, small amp, pair of junk speakers, and a bilge pump. I had mounted all the switches and the cb on the dash, which at the time, looked great.

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It was all ready for the water now. I got some new trailer led lights and wired it all up and took the boat to Alex?s house where she had a lake and a dock for me to test/store the boat. Well, we did test the boat motor before we bought it and it ran, but we never tested it on a lake. At full throttle that boat was going 5 mph. So we tied it up at the dock and took the trailer home so I could work on it. Tim welded on a new tongue and melted my wires in the process so I had to rewire the trailer again. Took the trailer apart, piece by piece, and replaced the leaf springs (one was broken), all the bolts, nuts, washers and lock washers, new bunks made out of treated wood with leftover carpet, new wheel hubs and wheels (wouldn?t hold air), scuffed up the paint and spray painted the whole trailer red (so I can see it in the water) and the axle a new coat of black. Also had to bend some metal back into position (taillight bracket) and buy all new rollers and bow stop.

Re: My 1972 Steury

It took me 3 weeks to finish the trailer and get my boat back on it. By that time the bottom of my boat had turned green from the lake and the motor wouldn?t start. It was a busy day on the lake and the police were at the launch ramp. I stayed with the boat as my dad drove to the ramp and asked if we could get a tow. Otherwise I would be paddling it to the ramp (not too far but just far enough to make it miserable). Police said they would be happy to but warned us that if an emergency arose that they would drop the line and leave me there in the water. They came with lights flashing and everything. As I was being towed to the ramp, I could see/feel everyone staring at me on the lake. We got it on trailer and brought it home. I opened up the engine and saw that one of my coils had blown. I replaced it and got it running again but didn?t have time to put it in the lake because summer was over. So I winterized it and put it into storage. I have pictured is what a coil should look like and a picture of the blown coil. The coil blew because the battery cables had been crossed. I don?t know if that was me or if it was the other guy.




The summer of 2008 I didn?t get it in the water because I didn?t have time. That was the summer I was working every weekend and working 40-50 hour weeks. In the spring of 2009 I got my motor running (in a trash can again) and decided to paint the boat the same color as my new truck (1994 Yukon). With Rik?s help, I scuffed up the paint/gel coat and filled in the holes I made in the dash. I towed it up to Rik?s house so that he could prime it, seal it (light blue), and paint it (dark, shiny blue) and get it finished before the 4th of July

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Rik finished painting it two days before we left to go to the cabin. Alex helped reassemble the boat enough to get it running. Hooked it up that night and went to the cabin for the first time with the boat. At the cabin we put it in the water, however, 5 mph is as fast as it would go and even then it was very choppy and unreliable. I didn?t dare go too far with the boat other than from the ramp to the dock and back




The following weekend, dad and I went to adjust some settings on the motor at the cabin. It was very windy and stupid me went downwind of the dock. The motor started sputtering so I turned around to go towards the dock when it died. We were maybe 50ft out from the dock when we started paddling. The wind pushed us past our neighbors dock and towards shore. We got the anchor out and used that to keep us from hitting the rocks. While we were waiting for Grandpa to come and rescue us, dad noticed that gas was shooting out of the carburetor. Well we got the boat towed back to the ramp and I brought it home.

I got a carb kit and fixed the carburetor early August. While it was home I made a center console and fit all the switches, 12v outlet, cb radio and the audio system. Brought it back to the cabin but it still wasn?t working right. Left it up there and came back the next weekend and replaced the points early September. Had tightened down the armature plate too tight so I had to put it back on the trailer, to the cabin, strip down the motor, loosen the plate and put everything back together. STILL wasn?t working right until dad and I went into town and got new spark plugs from Sandstone, MN. Apparently, whoever replaced the spark plugs last used lawnmower plugs instead of marine plugs. I didn?t know there was a difference until I looked in the spark plug manual. We put the plugs in and it started right up. Put it on the water and I instantly noticed a difference. Dad hopped in and started messing with the adjustments as I was driving and then all of a sudden, a big burst of speed. I was thrown back in my seat but dad wasn?t done yet. It kept getting faster and faster and was starting to scare me. It felt like the boat was flying on top of the water, like it wasn?t even in the water at all!. Dad and I were laughing and smiling and whacking each other. Who knew that a pair of plugs would do this? We headed back for the dock because the adjusters were loose and wouldn?t stay in place. After I tightened the screws, dad and I went out again. We were about 20ft from the dock when the engine quit. I tried to start the engine when dad was like, ?Michael,? shakes the gas tank, ?we?re out of gas.?

So far the boat has worked great. My current project is to install a generator. Since winter came too fast, I will be installing it in the spring of 2010. Currently, I don?t have pictures of the new center console but I will once spring has come.

Re: My 1972 Steury

ezmobee: Thanks for the photobucket idea. I couldn't figure out how everyone else was posting pics. Thanks again

Re: My 1972 Steury

Love your story and your Steury. Sounds like you guys had a lot of fun in the restoration. It's now a great looking boat.

There is one exactly like it for sale here, I am very tempted to go and pick it up.