Re: What makes my Chris Craft a premium brand?
Chris Craft is not alone in fluxuations in quality due to ownership change. My second boat was a 1984 Sea Ray Monaco 207. Truly a tank. Incredible storage everywhere. I had the XL version which was one of their first with the full aft sundeck versus jump seats beside the engine cowl. I finally traded it because I was tired of going 45mph at full throttle (350 merc). It handle great, was smooth as silk, but the weight and deep bow really slowed it down. After Sea Ray was purchased by Brunswick, they eliminated this model and their Seville line became their standard run about. At this time they also changed their model designation so that their length included the swim platform (my 207 became a 240). Another issue with mid 80's boats was the emergence of Volatile Controls enacted by the EPA and the very high demand for boats which caused ALL manufacuturers to switch gel coat and fiberglass resins. I believe this led to the blister problems that were non existent in the 70' to early 80's. Increased production demands led to faster setting resins which had much poorer gel coat to base bonds. Increased demand also reduced custom storage areas and led to the use of generic hardware (virtually all boats started to have identical hardware). I think this trend started to reverse itself in the late 90's, although the sea rays i looked at two years ago were still no match for the late 70's models.
Chris Craft is not alone in fluxuations in quality due to ownership change. My second boat was a 1984 Sea Ray Monaco 207. Truly a tank. Incredible storage everywhere. I had the XL version which was one of their first with the full aft sundeck versus jump seats beside the engine cowl. I finally traded it because I was tired of going 45mph at full throttle (350 merc). It handle great, was smooth as silk, but the weight and deep bow really slowed it down. After Sea Ray was purchased by Brunswick, they eliminated this model and their Seville line became their standard run about. At this time they also changed their model designation so that their length included the swim platform (my 207 became a 240). Another issue with mid 80's boats was the emergence of Volatile Controls enacted by the EPA and the very high demand for boats which caused ALL manufacuturers to switch gel coat and fiberglass resins. I believe this led to the blister problems that were non existent in the 70' to early 80's. Increased production demands led to faster setting resins which had much poorer gel coat to base bonds. Increased demand also reduced custom storage areas and led to the use of generic hardware (virtually all boats started to have identical hardware). I think this trend started to reverse itself in the late 90's, although the sea rays i looked at two years ago were still no match for the late 70's models.
