- Joined
- Jul 7, 2010
- Messages
- 14,975
For reasons of not needing to be, and not having the expertise to advise, I don't spend a lot of time in the resto forums. But, my father in law and I started a project yesterday, and I'm sure at some point I'll need some education/advise to get over a hump. In the meantime, I thought it'd be fun to post up the project.
The in-laws live down here in TN not too far from us. FIL is a car guy and has a fun collection of "drivers." But he had an old pontoon hanging around that he thought he'd like to fix up. It's a pre-1972 Crest that he bought at auction a while back, and it's the exact type of 'toon I grew up with as a kid. Their place is up by Dale Hollow Lake, so it's an easy tow over - and I like the open deck of this type of boat. You can arrange things however you like for whatever you're doing that day. So, we're digging into it!
She's a 20'. The deck is a disaster on top, but oddly the wood is pretty solid below (mostly). We're re-decking the boat and re-wiring the rigging. It has a '72 Johnson 25HP we're going to try to get going. It was sitting out quite a while, and the lower looks a little questionable, but the powerhead looks decent enough. So, more on that later.
Yesterday we got the boat blocked up in a semi-shady spot and started pulling the rails and sides.
The logs look rough, but they float so far as we can tell. We're not going for any real speed on this thing - it's literally gonna' barge along for slow cruises and enjoying the water - so, we've decided for the fun of it we're going to try to keep this on the cheap: get it usable and "nice," but not luxurious in any way.
Next step is to finish pulling the side rails, helm, seat and remote. We're guessing at another couple of evenings over the next week or so to get that done. Then we can get to the deck wood. We can see the flat heads that secure the wood to the aluminum, but we haven't quite figured them out yet. Anyone know where they can be ordered online? We're a ways out from that, but hoping to have it all cleaned up and splashed in August.
The in-laws live down here in TN not too far from us. FIL is a car guy and has a fun collection of "drivers." But he had an old pontoon hanging around that he thought he'd like to fix up. It's a pre-1972 Crest that he bought at auction a while back, and it's the exact type of 'toon I grew up with as a kid. Their place is up by Dale Hollow Lake, so it's an easy tow over - and I like the open deck of this type of boat. You can arrange things however you like for whatever you're doing that day. So, we're digging into it!
She's a 20'. The deck is a disaster on top, but oddly the wood is pretty solid below (mostly). We're re-decking the boat and re-wiring the rigging. It has a '72 Johnson 25HP we're going to try to get going. It was sitting out quite a while, and the lower looks a little questionable, but the powerhead looks decent enough. So, more on that later.
Yesterday we got the boat blocked up in a semi-shady spot and started pulling the rails and sides.
The logs look rough, but they float so far as we can tell. We're not going for any real speed on this thing - it's literally gonna' barge along for slow cruises and enjoying the water - so, we've decided for the fun of it we're going to try to keep this on the cheap: get it usable and "nice," but not luxurious in any way.
Next step is to finish pulling the side rails, helm, seat and remote. We're guessing at another couple of evenings over the next week or so to get that done. Then we can get to the deck wood. We can see the flat heads that secure the wood to the aluminum, but we haven't quite figured them out yet. Anyone know where they can be ordered online? We're a ways out from that, but hoping to have it all cleaned up and splashed in August.
op2:
