My First StarCraft; 1975 18' SuperSport

[DirtyHarry83]

I see the plan now. The shine of the boat will attract big fish into thinking there is a school of shad or other shiny bait fish.

Looks very good!

During daylight hours, may all observers be warned, do not look directly at the boat as it may cause blindness.

 

[classiccat]

I see the plan now. The shine of the boat will attract big fish into thinking there is a school of shad or other shiny bait fish.

Looks very good!

During daylight hours, may all observers be warned, do not look directly at the boat as it may cause blindness.

Thanks DH! For the murky places that I fish, they won't see the side of the boat until they're banging into the side of it :lol:.

I had to put the project onhold for a bit to get the old Chevy in shape to sell/trade in favor of a lightly used Tundra.

I took more of Astor's sound advice and applied a liberal coating (nearly 1 gallon) of fluid film on the entire chassis, body panels, rockers... hopefully this is the last truck that I ever buy!

 

[coostv]

I've seen fluid film used for snowplows, but never thought of using it on my truck, makes sense!

 

[classiccat]

I've seen fluid film used for snowplows, but never thought of using it on my truck, makes sense!

I sprung for the undercoating kit...cleaned the undercarriage really well (even though it's only a year old) and went to town! Here's a demo of the kit:

 

[astor]

that stuff works great, I need to use it more.

 

[classiccat]

pulled the boat (literally) out of storage this past weekend

 

[jbcurt00]

Great!

 

[GA_Boater]

Hey CC - When you put the mower deck on the Wheelhorse, what pitch are the blades, are you getting a good holeshot and doesn't that mirrored SS turn green from clippings? And how do you avoid running over the Admiral's flower beds with the long wheelbase? :smile:

She looks good after a long winters nap.

 

[classiccat]

Great!

Thanks jb! Great that you're still kickin' around here!

Hey CC - When you put the mower deck on the Wheelhorse, what pitch are the blades, are you getting a good holeshot and doesn't that mirrored SS turn green from clippings? And how do you avoid running over the Admiral's flower beds with the long wheelbase? :smile:

She looks good after a long winters nap.

Thanks GaB! Glad you're still kickin' around here too!

Not a very good hole-shot with the 8hp cast iron flathead, Low-1 and a 90-degree mower blade pitch. :lol:

Needless to say, the Admiral's rose bush lived through the "FULL PULL"!

I torqued-up my lower back pulling the rig to the back of the property last winter...tractor has already earned it's keep. :thumb:

 

[DirtyHarry83]

I torqued-up my lower back pulling the rig to the back of the property last winter...tractor has already earned it's keep. :thumb:

You may consider picking things up and putting them down? Possibly pushups? "Hear me now, and believe me later."

Seriously, sorry to hear you torqued your back and that tractor shows you use your head to work smart

The Tractor is clean! looking. I look forward to seeing the boat. That tractor was also a rebuild project for you?

 

[classiccat]

You may consider picking things up and putting them down? Possibly pushups? "Hear me now, and believe me later."

Seriously, sorry to hear you torqued your back and that tractor shows you use your head to work smart

The Tractor is clean! looking. I look forward to seeing the boat. That tractor was also a rebuild project for you?

Thanks DH! I wasn't working smart when i hurt myself (pulling the boat up a grass incline w/out help) :facepalm: :lol:

It wasn't too dramatic...more of a nagging pain that resulted in a cortisone shot.

Yeah the tractor was a frame-up restoration that I started in February.

Here's my thread from over on Red Square. 1981 Wheel Horse C85

 

[DirtyHarry83]

Really good looking work!

 

[classiccat]

2 coats of gluv-it was achieved applying it surgically using (true story!)....a catheter syringe

With the double-seam well sealed (I used G-Flex on the outer seam when it was turtled), I can finish-up the final step of outer chine reinforcement.

24" Width (limited by my brace) covers 3 ribs

then secured with 3/16" rivets:

2 approaches to outer chine reinforcement were used here... If I were to pick one over the other, it would be this^^^. It's very strong, can be done solo, no additional rivets below the waterline and most importantly, you don't disturb the double-seam.

 

[classiccat]

Now on to the deck. I'm using 1/2" in an effort to keep weight to a minimum as well as maintain windshield alignment.

To minimize the trampoline feeling, I'm adding some sub-deck reinforcements.

I'm making my own U-channel,

One method of securing it to the original stringers by 1st attaching vertical risers using 3/16" solid rivets.

then riveting the cross-brace to the vertical risers:

^^^ This aft-most brace will define the forward edge of my bilge access; I like some elbow room :lol:

It's crazy how this single brace stiffens-up the stringers.

That's where we're at! Probably a day or 2 of cutting and bending, then I'll be dry fitting the deck and finalizing my plan for attacking the foam.

Thanks for stoppin' by! :yo:

 

[GA_Boater]

Oh no! Nurse Ratchet is squirtin' Gluvit! LOL

Nice work on the chine fixin', CC.

 

[Watermann]

Yeah man he's back in action once again :whoo:

Looking good, there's nothing else like stiffening things up :eyebrows:

 

[poorboy1990]

Wow. Just got done reading all 87 pages. If you don't mind I may steal some of your ideas for on my rebuild. Yours is looking great. Keep up the great work. Now to back to working on mine and seeing what the PO hid with some new floor.

 

[classiccat]

Oh no! Nurse Ratchet is squirtin' Gluvit! LOL

Nice work on the chine fixin', CC.

Full labotomy if this doesn't stop the drip!

:lol:

Yeah man he's back in action once again :whoo:

Looking good, there's nothing else like stiffening things up :eyebrows:

I think we already trademarked "Alumagra" somewhere in this 87+ pages of yap! It's good to finally be in a position to focus on this again...banged 150 rivets home yesterday and It. Was. Awesome!

Wow. Just got done reading all 87 pages. If you don't mind I may steal some of your ideas for on my rebuild. Yours is looking great. Keep up the great work. Now to back to working on mine and seeing what the PO hid with some new floor.

It would be an honor pb1990! If you're unable to see any images (photobucket nonsense), don't hesistate to PM me a link to the post # and i'll update the post with an imgur posting.

 

[classiccat]

Quick update on the project and what I think are a few useful tidbits.

Finished the sub-deck structure yesterday and got the process dialed-in.

1st, I elected to position the cross braces between ribs to divide the load to the stringer-to-rib rivets.

Using a barclamp to position the stringer, I went along each rib gap, tightened the clamp until I liked the position of the stringer. The first few aft-most spacings are 25"...then they get progressively smaller as you move forward.

this is what I measured on my tub:

I then cut cross-braces and vertical risers from sheet aluminum.

You might not believe me when I say this, but I've used the same jigsaw blade for all of these cuts. these dewalt aluminum/fiberglass bits are great! I run this HF jigsaw with 3-speed and "I" oscillation...cuts through aluminum like butter.

 

[classiccat]

since they were cut free-hand with a jigsaw, it's critical to find the center point of each end using a combination square...then make a template for quickly marking the ends for lining-up on the bending brake.

The outer marks are for the cross-brace and the inner marks are for the vertical risers (bottom is my control):

^^^ we're not building a space shuttle here...otherwise I would've used nicer marks. kind of like we're playing horseshoes. :lol: