1959 Starcraft 16' Super Constellation - Winner 2016 Starmada SOTY Award

[ssdale]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

I'm sure it has been covered a million times, BUT - What is the best final finish for the non anodized aluminum castings?? Such as the rear corners and in my case the windlass anchor? A po had painted all of these items with aluminum paint which I have stripped. The surfaces range from smooth to textured.

Should I just polish with Mothers and then let oxidize? Any advice appreciated.

Dale

 

[64osby]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Shark Hide and Shiela Shine are two products that will leave a protective coating. I have not used them but my understanding is both need or require ongoing applications over time to maintain the finish. Both products are a little pricey if you have just a couple parts to maintain.

Personally I just sand smooth and polish with steel wool then let it oxidize. If it needs a little brightening work I polish it again.

 

[jasoutside]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

I've used Shark Hide for stuff, I like like it a bunch...

Sharkhide

 

[ssdale]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration


Installed the re-furbished transom and old school aluminum "backer plate?". A PO must have constructed this transom of very solid yellow pine not too long ago. Even used all stainless hardware, so I decided to re-use it. According to the literature here on iboats, the original transom was mahogany, but I had a heck of a time finding mahogany for the seats, (more on that later), so stripped the old blue paint, primed and painted the old transom with Oxford white acrylic enamel-same as the boat. Buffed out a small section of the stern below the transom that will not get paint. Will tape off and paint from the short gussets to the floor with the floor color. This is as simple as transom replacement gets:watermelon:




In the area below the transom there is a tag the is almost totally illegible except for the word " Aluminum". I did a few image searches and found this photo of an ALCOA aluminum sticker that was attached to the boat when new in 1959. It measures 1.5 in. tall x 3 in. wide. If anyone has seen this tag on other boats, chime in or links to someone who could make a new decal like the original that was printed on a thin strip of aluminum. My neighbors wife does lettering for trucks etc... and can make one out of vinyl- not sure if worth the trouble?

Thanks,
Dale

 

[jasoutside]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Yellow Pine? As in solid (not ply)? Hmmm, I don't think I'd use yellow pine anywhere in a boat except maybe a trim piece here/there for looks only. For a transom? Eh, nah.

Before you go further you might want to seriously swapping that out for a nice piece of ply (Arauco, MG, MDO, Mahogony, Exterior, heck anything pretty much).

 

[59 Fatty]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

View attachment 223940
Installed the re-furbished transom and old school aluminum "backer plate?". A PO must have constructed this transom of very solid yellow pine not too long ago. Even used all stainless hardware, so I decided to re-use it. According to the literature here on iboats, the original transom was mahogany, but I had a heck of a time finding mahogany for the seats, (more on that later), so stripped the old blue paint, primed and painted the old transom with Oxford white acrylic enamel-same as the boat. Buffed out a small section of the stern below the transom that will not get paint. Will tape off and paint from the short gussets to the floor with the floor color. This is as simple as transom replacement gets:watermelon:

View attachment 223941View attachment 223942


In the area below the transom there is a tag the is almost totally illegible except for the word " Aluminum". I did a few image searches and found this photo of an ALCOA aluminum sticker that was attached to the boat when new in 1959. It measures 1.5 in. tall x 3 in. wide. If anyone has seen this tag on other boats, chime in or links to someone who could make a new decal like the original that was printed on a thin strip of aluminum. My neighbors wife does lettering for trucks etc... and can make one out of vinyl- not sure if worth the trouble?

Thanks,
Dale

Dale,
I had DiscontinuedDecals.com - DiscontinuedDecals.com specializes in the Reproduction of Discontinued Decals make a few decals I couldn't find anywhere for the spark plug covers on my Fat 50. I'm sure they can help, and their quality is top knotch. This is not vinyl lettering.
Dave

 

[ssdale]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Yellow Pine? As in solid (not ply)? Hmmm, I don't think I'd use yellow pine anywhere in a boat except maybe a trim piece here/there for looks only. For a transom? Eh, nah.

Before you go further you might want to seriously swapping that out for a nice piece of ply (Arauco, MG, MDO, Mahogony, Exterior, heck anything pretty much).

Well its it's some kinda pine and is really solid and not soft and splintery like the white pine you get at the lumberyard. It was the ONLY piece of wood on the boat that was exposed that was not rotted at all. I thought of doubling up 3/4 treated, but the top edge is exposed and the edges are really hard to keep sealed. The good thing is that if it is not the right thing, it is really easy to just take off the cast corners and replace.

 

[ssdale]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Dale,
I had DiscontinuedDecals.com - DiscontinuedDecals.com specializes in the Reproduction of Discontinued Decals make a few decals I couldn't find anywhere for the spark plug covers on my Fat 50. I'm sure they can help, and their quality is top knotch. This is not vinyl lettering.
Dave

Thanks for the link. Shot them an e-mail with label example-see if they want to do such an obscure thing and cost? For some wacky reason, I love the label design and the little obscure details are what people always seem to notice and comment on. Hope they can do it.
Thanks again,
Dale

 

[Watermann]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Well its it's some kinda pine and is really solid and not soft and splintery like the white pine you get at the lumberyard. It was the ONLY piece of wood on the boat that was exposed that was not rotted at all. I thought of doubling up 3/4 treated, but the top edge is exposed and the edges are really hard to keep sealed. The good thing is that if it is not the right thing, it is really easy to just take off the cast corners and replace.

Looks to me like you could easily fab up a transom cap to protect that wood. Also forget the treated ply, bad chemicals for AL and not needed.

 

[ssdale]

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration

Re: 1959 Starcraft - About to start restoration



I have some nice aluminum channels that I looked at for making a cap but talked myself out of it because of the curve of the top of the transom. IMHO Nothing about this boat was designed to hold up against constant exposure to the elements. All of the wood will definite go to #X!! if not kept inside or at least tarped. I am trying to improve on a few things and make it functional, but this is going to be more of a parade piece than an every weekend in the water. It is over an hour and a half to The Lake of the Ozarks or to Mark Twain Lake so I am left with the shallow Gasconade or the swift and muddy Missouri River -not for amateurs. If I can get out on the water three times a year is about it

Will not divulge my source of this Philippine mahogany-lets just say that I was lucky to have talked to an old cabinet maker that had these packed away in his barn for over a decade. No glue necessary for these wide screen beauties:faint2:
No second chances. Second shot shows what was left of one of the benches. Going to have to finish stripping the pieces that I hope to salvage


Dale

 

[ssdale]

Just getting back to this project after LOONG absence.

 

[ssdale]

No Title

Just getting back to this project after LOONG absence. In Spring of 2014 my local paint shop mixed the Caribbean turquoise as a flat instead of GLOSS and I was not happy with the adherence of the Oxford white to the hull exterior. It did really discourage me to do all of the rework. So I fianally am re-motivated and completely restriped the exterior and re-sanded the bow. We had a few warm days a week or so ago and I finally repainted everything. I know you can't tell much from the pics, but in person it looks a lot better.

Still have a lot of blue paint to get rid of on the origanol mahogany seat backs,

 

[Woodonglass]

I'd say she's looking Might-T-Fine!!!! I'm Loving the Colors!!!!:thumb:

 

[K-2]

Cool project and you are doing some nice work!

 

[GA_Boater]

You got it going, ssdale. The paint snafu would put me in a bad mood. She's looking great. A 2015 splash coming up?

 

[ssdale]

Thanks for the compliments- I'm pretty far away from a splash!! This forum has been my inspiration to always try to "kick it up a notch" and I hope that my posts will give someone else the same thrill as it has given me to see ALL of the great amounts of time, skill and creativity that are shown on these posts.

I have researched the literature here on IBOATS and found photos of my StarCraft from a 1958 Brochure that identifies my boat as a Super Constellation. I have not found any other Super Constellations that have been the subject of a restoration on this forum. If anyone else has, or can tell me how to do a definitive search, let me know.??

Also, is the "finished projects" section permanently closed?? I would like to post my 1965 Cherokee project from a few years back. Since I have been gone for a while, it seems that I cannot locate any of my old photo downloads? Any help would be appreciated.

Dale

 

[jbcurt00]

Send GA a PM if he doesn't send you one in the next day or 2 about the completed projects section. A Mod has to walk you thru the how to create a topic to submit, and then they'll move it to the completed projects section.

The pix may be a problem if the only copy you had was the 1 you uploaded to iboats. The software upgrade thru a huge monkey wrench in the mix and previously uploaded pix was 1 of the big losses. If you no longer have a digital copy of the pix or the photo you scanned the pix may be forever lost.

If you uploaded them to a 3rd party pix site, the pix should still be there, just the link to it in a resto thread may be broken.

NICE work on the paint and colors so far!

 

[ssdale]

Thanks JB for the refresher on the completed projects section. Will see if GA reaches out as I am a little rusty with this.

My pics are all still on my computer, but when I try to re-upload them to iBOATS, I get an, upload- "unknown error" message. I was hoping that was because they were still somewhere on iBOATS and I was just too dumb to see how to get to them. From your explanation that is not the case and they were wiped out by the software upgrade.

I wonder why my older pics wont upload as my recent ones uploaded fine? Guess this has been covered elsewhere? Any help is appreciated. Sorry for these tech posts in the forum.

Dale

 

[GA_Boater]

You may have the only Super Connie on iboats. She's the first I've seen here, Dale. Was the Cherokee under another username or ssdale? Any idea what a thread or partial thread title might be?

 

[jbcurt00]

I use a 3rd party pix host site, and like Photobucket over other options. It lets me copy the IMG code for each pix, it looks this:
{www.tallshipmodels.com/pictures/enlarged/749-chris-craft-triple-cockpit-model-limited4.jpg}
and the pix are resized (is suspect this is part of the problem you're having) to work w/ the forum, and show up nice and big IN my posts not as attachements: