1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

[Robert D]

Okay, July 1, 2012....starting another restoration! Picked up a '72 Lancer, that the previous owner didn't have time to finish. The hull is in good shape, just 2 or 3 small spots I'll need to fix. The interior cushions/vinyl will need to be replaced, as well as the carpet. Original seat frames are all there for patterns. Carpet isn't bad, just not my preference.....and I will be replacing the deck anyway. (Starting to show some dry rot on the edges, where there is a well in the deck and around the opening to the bilge. The boat weighed in at 2990 lbs on the trailer axle, so I assumed it had waterlogged foam underneath.....just inspected it, and I can find no flotation foam! Appears to simply be a heavy boat as I have heard. (Pretty thick glass on the keel.)

The stringers, as well as the part the motor mounts to, appear to be in excellent shape. If I understand correctly, the only wood in the stringers are back where the motor mounts. (It's a small block Chevy by the way, upgraded by the second owner to a later model 350, marinized by a Yamaha dealer. Looks very professional.) Volvo 270 outdrive.

Here's a few pics of some details I found interesting:

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Also a couple items that seem to be in good shape. Wondering how rare the original spotlight is? Anyone know?

 

[Pmccraney]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Cool boat... Let's see some pictures of the whole rig... Looks like its in great shape with a lot of original brightware/parts, etc...

Looking forward to following along.

Have fun!

Patrick

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

I'll put some pics up when I return from vacation. The good news is the oxidized hull. I test polished a 2' square area, and it came out looking pretty good! (A 9 out of 10 I'd say)

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Back from vacation, will get some pics up this week......whenever I get it out of the garage. Flushed the fuel tank, fuel lines, replaced fuel filter/water separater, replaced spark plugs, plug wires.....distributer cap & rotor look new. Rebuild kit for the Quadrajet on the way. Sucked all the old oil out, dumped in new oil, sucked it out till clean.

Identified the motor as a 1990 Chevy 350 with bowtie heads; Prior owner paid a Yamaha dealer to install and marinize it. They seem to have done a professional job, even attached a Yamaha serial number on it. They used Mercruiser exhaust manifolds/risers. I'll be pulling those as wellf or inspection. They appear to be quite new, as well as all the hoses and hose clamps.

I'll be pulling it out of the garage next week to go get the title submitted, along with the required VIN inspection. Will be backing it into the water for an engine test run after that. If the engine runs as good as it looks, I can start on the deck and interior stuff. The transom looks excellent, no rot at all. The transom wood is simply a piece of plywood laminated to the inside of the transom. starting about 2 inches from teh bottom of the V, and ending 8 inches from the top of the transom. It doesn't even go all the way across. Maybe a foot from reaching the sides of the boat. I'm thinking Chris Craft felt it was just a reinforcement for mounting the outdrive, added onto the inside. I could trim the glass around the edges of this thing in 20 minutes and remove it! (After removing the engine and outdrive of course.) I'm not going to mess with it unless the motor needs to be pulled.....if that ends up being the situation, I'll put a much larger piece of wood in there!

 

[Brenn]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

cant wait to see pics of the boat

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

A few pics from inside the garage.....if you look at the clear hose draining the fuel, you can see water in the fuel coming out. This was before a 30 second gush of pure water came out. The hull pic sort of shows a part of the oxidation that came off well....

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Rebuilt the Quadrajet last night. It appears as the fuel tank sits in the bow, slightly higher than the engine at the stern, that fuel steadily siphoned back, overfilling the float bowl. The red crud is the old fuel. The screen filter was gummed up as well.

 

[Pmccraney]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Wow.. my boat has a twin... awesome....

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

A twin? I'll bet there's a triplet out there somewhere

Sea water pump is a Sherwood G3....no longer made, but the impeller is still available. (On order....) The insid eof the pump cover looked pretty corroded and had several deep scratches. I threw it on the lathe and refinished it, and took an equal amount off the bolt flange. Judging by the wear pattern insid ethe bearing, the shaft has about 1/8th of an inch end play in the cover.....so the .oo8 I took off won't matter.

What a place to start on this....but i want to get the engine up and running to see if I have to pull it, prior to starting on the hull and deck.

 

[Luhrs28]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Hey I think Richard Dreyfuss drove one of those Chris-Craft's in the early scenes in Jaws. Nice lathe work by the way!

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Jaws....better not tell the wife, she'll get scared. Got my trailer title transferred today, with registration.....$180.00....then the boat title + registration with the Oregon Marine Board, $95.00

Tested engine on muffs, after getting a new starter and battery....$120 for starter and $82.00 for a battery. getting expensive!

Took it down to the boat launch for a test run in the water, on the trailer.....will post a video soon on that. Seems the prior owner was accurate, this appears to be a pretty new engine as he stated. (He had about $6000 in receipts the year before he put it in storage.) I put 4 gallons of gas in it as I drained the tank, and didn't think it probably doesn't draw from the bottom. I ran out of gas about 30 minutes into the testing! I suppose that leaves room for water to settle in the bottom of the tank and not get sucked up?) I have a bit more tuning to do before I put it back in the shop for the next 12 months....will do that tomorrow.

Inside of the boat.....previous owner had new carpet installed in 2005, and has been stored inside since.

Engine.....Chevy 5.7....marinized by Yamaha. Intake manifold says 1992, however NAPA's book shows it as from a 1994-1996 Chevy Camaro.

Finally outside in the sun!

In the ski locker, looking aft......it seems they installed new deck supports 6 or 7 years ago, covered then with resin....

Looking towards the bow....must be th eoriginal carpet there?

Huge galvanized fuel tank in the bow......40 gallons maybe?

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Test run today....first time engine has been warmed up since 2005/2006!

[video]http://s1093.photobucket.com/albums/i424/rdezsofi/Chris%20Craft%20outside/?action=view&current=2012-07-23160850.mp4[/video]

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Well....I am thinking it didn't run out of fuel. Pulled the anti-siphon valve off the top of the tank and cleaned the crud pictured below out of it. I realized this evening I forgot to check the valve when I did the rest of the fuel system. I'm temporarily bypassing the check valve for tomorrow's test run again....will go through 5 gallons of gas and change the large fuel filter afterwards.

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Engine runs well, cleaned up a few corroded grounds, so time to start looking at the hull. I wet sanded the transom to remove the lettering that was painted on....finished with 1000 grit....and wow, it looks more blue than the rest of the hull. (Which now appears a shade of green!) I'll be doing the entire outside of the hull anyway, after I fix several scratches/gouges.

I found a gouge right at the bottom of the transom, that had a piece of glass stuck over it. I sanded it off, and it's just a pinhole....but dampness appeared! Cut out the deck to take a look at the inside. Discovered original decking, still in good shape. I confirmed the stringers are hollow, by reaching inside the drain opening they put in....connecting the center bilge area with the outer area. The wood beams are only deck supports, and just rest on the stringers. Not glassed on or attached in any manner. (Even to the transom.) I did discover the exact place on the inside of the hull, from where the dampness appeared. The transom wood is above this point, and it's just really thin fiberglass below the wood part of the transom. I'll sand it down, build it up thicker and glass it with epoxy on the inside before i do the outside.

The factory drain to connect to the inner bilge area.....not very high quality finish work it seems.

...and, looking to the bow under the deck. Pretty clean, none of that lousy wet flotation stuff, but a big spider was in there!

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Pulled the outdrive and the motor on Saturday. Much to my relief, the transom is solid even in the mounting holes.... I'll go ahead and coat the exposed wood with epoxy though. I've ordered a lot of parts...o-rings, bellows, etc....and will be replacingeverything while it's apart. A general cleanup of the bilge area is in order. The factory left it as bare woven roving, and I'll likely finish it smooth and coat it with something.

Using a 1/2" bar to push out the last pin

I have the engine sitting forward about 4 feet.....when I'm done with th ebilge area, I'll slide it back and move forward. Damn thing is heavy!

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

I have the bellhousing off the engine, have installed new bearings and seals. Working on the transom shield at this point. Made some new steering yoke bushings out of bronze......picked up an end piece from EBay and machined it perfectly. Less than .06 mm play in the shaft, but after greasing it, zero play. Should last forever. (Forever= 50+ years I guess?)

Doing a little fiberglass work in the bilge area. I want to smooth it out and probably line it with a bilge paint or maybe even a rubberized bedliner material.

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Oh ya, picked up a stainless steel propeller......not ready to put that on quite yet, but a nice toucj when I'm done with the outdrive and engine!

 

[HorizonblueDK]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

Nice project, love these "restore old boat" threads.

A friend of mine have an old boat with a "Taylor Made" search light, like the one you have on STB side. The one on his boat is operated from inside, via a handle, but the housing appears to be approx the same. Do you have any idea on where we can purchase a new beam(lens) for this search light ?

I believe it's blown, since it doesn't work anymore, and I have checked that there is 12 Volt supplied to it.

 

[Robert D]

Re: 1972 Chris Craft Lancer 19

I haven't got into the search light yet, but I do recall it says GE (General Electric) on the lens. I'll take a closer look tonight and see if thyere is a part number or some way to identify it.