Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

[screwloose]

I figured I'd post this over here, I had posted a few questions about it before I bought it about the way the new transom was redone but got no real replies.

Its a 15' Starcraft, the title says 1960, it measures just a bit over 15', its 6' wide at the windshield, and has a 15" transom.

It was originally for sale on CL with a manual start 33hp, it was for sale for a long time with no takers at $1300 with a running motor ready to use. The seller finally sold the motor separate and offered the boat for $500 cash with no motor, no trailer.

The boat has a new transom, and new deck. The deck is 1/2" plywood with a layer or two of glass mat and resin on both sides, glassed in place.
The transom now is the odd part, the guy who owned this worked for a fiberglass shop that did a lot of heavy truck work and some older Corvette restoration work. My guess is that the transom failed, so he fixed it the only way he knew how, with fiberglass he had on hand. What he did was to cut away the damaged area, basically the immediate area around the motor, he then dug out the old wood core, then he laid up a new transom using both glass mat, and premade fiberglass panels meant for trailer repairs on semi trailers. I think the result was about 7 layers of both glass and heavily sanded fiberglass panels cut to fit snugly in the transom cavity. He then glassed up and closed up the torn out section of the outer transom skin. This was all done several years ago and the boat has been in use with a 33hp Evinrude for some time now.
He had pics of the whole process, and the fact that its lasted this long pretty much eased my mind on the method.
It no doubt added weight but certainly no more weight than a wet wood transom would ad, and at that, I doubt it could have added more than maybe 20 or so lbs over the original plywood core.
The only part I wish he did was to make it a 20" transom.

I now need to find a motor suitable for this boat, the 33hp was pretty fast, it moved the boat in the 30 mph range but that's going by the GPS in my phone.
I drove it when he first listed it but wasn't too fond of the manual start motor, or the short transom but after he sold the motor, and I found a trailer elsewhere we made a trade and money exchanged hands. I had a tractor for sale for the same amount, and what it boils down to is that I'd have taken $200 for the tractor but had it listed high. I'm sure he felt the same way about the boat. Guessing by the sale sign in front of his house and a for sale sign on every car in the yard, he either needed cash or was moving. Either way, I now own a 1960 Starcraft.

The boat looks to have had two bench seats, they're gone and the new deck has two steel pedestals and two padded fold down seats. They work but attached to the 1/2" floor with my 300lbs on them will no doubt make them flex a bit more than I like. The last owner did put a backing plate on the bottom side of the new deck, but my guess is that its only 3/16" aluminum plate attached to the underside. The seat posts have stainless studs sticking up and nylock nuts and washers holding the seat posts down. The seats actually felt better on the water than sitting on the trailer for some reason.
I thought about maybe putting in a set of back to back seats so I have a reverse fishing seat as well. The boat also came with a matching Bimini top.

Repairs are mainly going to be paint, the whole boat was at one point repainted, both the top blue, and lower white paint are peeling, apparently it wasn't sanded at all. The bottom paint blasts right off with a pressure washer. Removing the paint shows a few patch jobs on the keel, but nothing big and the repairs look old. The last owner said he never got around to painting it, but gave me 2 quarts of blue and a gallon and a half of white Sherwin Williams automotive paint and hardener with the boat. He also gave me a blue/gray color paint he intended to use on the deck.

The boat has its original cable steering, which is intact and in good shape, I'll probably leave it since I sort of liked the slower ratio it gives vs. a Teleflex cable.
I also got a complete extra set of trim, a new rub rail, and set of new cleats with the boat.
The existing rub rail is rough, its broke and cracked in a few spots and is cut short at the rear. The spare one however is painted black with thick paint. I have to find a way to strip off the black paint and polish up the metal before mounting it.

My big question is what size motor to look for? I don't care about how fast it goes, but I do want to be able to get on plane. I have a 25hp Mercury but its a long shaft. The only short shaft motor I have for remote control is an older 20hp Mercury.
I was thinking about making a riser panel, one that fills the whole width of the splashwell opening, to both raise the transom so I can use a 20" motor, and one that will deflect water a bit but just putting a 5" riser won't have enough strength,so the next thing would be to make an adapter bracket off the back and set the motor back a bit and up a few inches. What he should have done was to build the whole transom up to 20" but I guess since he had the short 33hp, he just left it 15".

I'd love to find a good four stroke for this but I doubt I'd find an affordable used short shaft remote type four stroke motor for sale.

 

[jbcurt00]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

I think you started this thread & got several replies:
glass hull transom question...

I looked at an older 15' Starcraft boat yesterday. The last owner replaced the deck and transom. He's a body guy that specializes in fiberglass truck body repair and trailers.
He did the job where he works. He's got pics of the whole repair. The deck looks fine, he removed the old wood, there's no flotation under the deck, just glass tubes or stringers.
He cut and fiberglassed the new 1/2" plywood with two layers of glass mat on both sides and resin, then glassed the new deck in place feathering the edges into the sides of the hull. That part looks great, it just needs to be painted.
On the transom, since the outer skin had torn away, he worked mostly from the outside. He cut away the area where the motor sat, he dug out all the old wood, ground the surrounding glass a bit and proceeded to lay up a new transom using both glass mat and recycled fiberglass trailer panels and mat. The result is a rock hard solid transom but I've just never heard of this being done before?
I'm sure it added some weight but I doubt its all that much on such a small transom. The solid glass area is about 57" x 15" x 1.5". He left the original corners intact and worked around them fitting the new panels and mat in behind the uncut sections of the outer skin. Other than the lack of an aluminum transom cap, you can't tell by looking at it and the 33hp motor on it don't budge.
My question is if this is an acceptable repair? Does it sound like a repair that will last? My concern I guess is the thickness of the entire glass panel now. I have little doubt about the rear panel being cut, he had no choice since the motor basically fell off tearing the transom rearward.
He also didn't try to hide any of the past repairs, if he didn't mention what was done or show me pics, I'd have never guessed it. I'd probably have assumed it was a poured transom.

But here's your pix large & easy to see:

You asked if the repairs were sound & seaworthy, but if I were mine to decide how to proceed, I wouldn't consider that it had been done particularly well, and certainly not well enough to buy a motor, install it & run it without doing LOTS of probing & a thorough inspection.

This pix is why:

Up front, under the helm, the new fiberglass work appears to be done over un-prepped gelcoat (bad enough), un-prepped Zolotone (doesn't look like that type of interior fiberglass finish, but I would have expected it to be) or worse un-prepped paint. And there was certainly no work done forward of this because there is no evidence that the footrest panel was prepped or removed & replaced. And there appears to be some flaking (cracking) of this white interior finish material directly centered along the right side of this pix (just above & forward of the garbage bag covering the helm seat. I also doubt that a 'good' 'body guy' would mask the face of a speedo gauge, but not the sides, and wouldn't remove (or at lease mask ) the flip switches before he sprayed the cap & dash blue, unless he was in a rush to get it painted & looking like it had received lots of attention to detail, and appear that it had been well done. When that was likely not the case.

As a Starcraft, you are certainly free to post your threads where ever you choose. But because it's fiberglass, you'd get lots more relevant help over in the Resto section where you started the other thread before you bought the boat. Although you mention you asked some questions that went unanswered above, you had 5 replies in just over 24hrs, and your last post to that thread included this:

I'm pretty much thinking that for the price its well worth the chance. I'll just wear a life vest I guess till I come to trust the repair. If my 300lbs jumping on the lower unit don't move the transom, I doubt if its going anywhere. Also, with the smaller motor, its not under nearly as much load.

I don't plan to take it far, just in the river and a few back bays and creeks for crabbing. If it sinks in most of the places I go, it'll only be in a few feet of water. If I were looking to go fast or hang a big motor on it I'd be more concerned. Maybe only after it proves itself for a few years I'll add a bigger motor.

So I'm not exactly clear what questions weren't answered.

If you want to run a 20" motor on a 15" transom, you can.

If you want to raise the transom so that a 20" motor 'fits', you can, but you'll likely be tearing the existing transom down & completely rebuilding it taller, so all of the above Q&A about a seaworthy repair by the previous owner will be irrelevant. And modifying the splashwell to accommodate that taller transom.

You can purchase a jack plate, mount it thru your existing transom and mount & run your 20" motor fairly easily. I WOULDN'T (not without doing LOTS of investigation into the repairs for the reasons above), but it would be possible.

Since you didn't post a length, it's near impossible to suggest a correct size motor. The 1960 Starcraft brochure lists 3 glass boats, 14', 15' & a 17', w/ motors ranging from 10hp-80hp.

 

[North Beach]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

Well if it is a 15 footer and it is a 60 model then it would be the Voyager and at the time was rated up to 60 HP.

 

[screwloose]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

I started a new post here since the last one was before I owned this boat. I had actually given up on the deal when he offered it as a trade minus the motor. If the moderators feel this post if better served in the resto section, go ahead and move it.

The seller had pics of the job in stages in an album, I'll try to get copies if I can.
The deck itself was glassed top and bottom over 1/2" plywood, then laid in place and sealed lightly around the edges. The original deck was only screwed in place. Years ago a relative had a very similar Sea King boat that looked almost identical to this one, the deck in that was put down the same way, I remember being just a kid and having to unscrew the whole deck to fish out run away crabs that slipped under the deck while out on the water. The entire deck is one full sheet of plywood with the front edges trimmed to fit.

The shop that he works at does truck trailer repairs and painting but I don't think he painted the boat, he only painted over the the areas where he cut the transom and cap. The paint is obviously different there.
The paint on the bottom is washing off, the entire hull is bare fiberglass, no color in the glass at all. Paint which was below the water line is wrinkled like it got hit with solvent.
The boat don't leak a drop. I took the pressure washer to it today in the rain and was able to remove 90% of all the loose paint, basically everything below the lower strake.

My only concern about the transom is whether or not such a repair is viable or safe, I know what wood will withstand, but this thing is all glass panels. Its like a chunk of stone back there. I suppose thats why he left off the trim.

There's no way I'd even consider tearing into the transom, it would be cheaper to just buy another boat. There's cheap boats all over right now. Just no aluminum boats, which is why I bought this.
The transom was holding the 40hp he had on it just fine, but it was way too deep. The anti-cavitation plate was 6" below the bottom of the hull. I may try it with the 20hp I have just to see what it'll do. The hull can't weigh very much, I can lift either end off the trailer with ease.
Its as light or lighter than my smaller aluminum boat in the bow.

I'm not too worried about appearance, the paint can wait, just so no damage is being done by using it the way it is.
I can sand and paint it anytime, if it turns out to be a keeper.
I may remove all the glass work around the edges of the deck and just fill that gap with 5200 sealer. The original floor wasn't glassed in place.
The white on the inside of the boat is some sort of speckle paint or coating, its rough to the touch and doesn't rub off. The spots you see are glue marks on the sides from old carpet or something.

Another thing is that this has no flotation other than a block of white foam under the deck that's held in place by two strips of rubrail stapled to the glass supports under the bow deck. Maybe the trapped area ahead of your feet contains foam?
The panel ahead of your feet is fiberglass, no wood to replace there and no wood stringers in these. The only wood from day one is the wood in the transom. The dash, gunwales, and bow deck are all reinforced with glass laid over a sacrificial form. There is not enough area below the deck for foam, the fiberglass stringers are only an inch or so deep. The gunwales are hollow and have the cable and pulleys in them for the steering so foam can't be added there.

Being that my first boat many years ago was an old Johnson trihull, this thing is a huge step up. Its lighter, its got a flat bottom, and it don't need a huge motor to run it. With gas at nearly $4 now that's a big plus. Even so I figure this thing will burn $75 per day in gas. I burn 8 gallons per day in my 14' aluminum boat with the 20hp motor just running out to where I fish on the river. This will no doubt double or triple that depending on what motor I hang on it.

The area around the edges of the deck isn't prepped and I'm sort of glad it wasn't. The white you see is the outer hull, its less than 1/8" thick there The entire hull is made up of woven mat that resembles burlap. Any grinding there would no doubt compromise the fibers as they are barely covered with resin on these old boats. I've seen a few of these running around with no deck at all, just a loose plywood panel tossed in. The deck adds very little strength to this hull, I sort of figured it was more or less just so you didn't drop the anchor through the bottom of the boat.
Its bad enough that the deck don't go all the way to the rear, it stops at the forward edge of the splashwell. There's just enough room off the edge to sit two 6 gallon gas cans and a battery.

One improvement I may make, which may not be in the best interest of a boat this age is to add a glass windshield. I hate plexiglass and how easy it scratches. I have a five panel windshield from a junk boat that's the right width, if I can figure how to make it fit atop the curved bow deck.

 

[GA_Boater]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

Hey screw - good luck getting the boat the way you want. I don't know much about glass techniques but a transom is a transom. If you mount a motor, you can do the standard test - Stand on the A/V plate and gently bounce on it. The transom shouldn't flex one bit. If ir does the PO's idea didn't work. It's really that simple.

If the transom is strong and you are going ahead with finishing her up, here's a way to put a flat bottomed windshield on a curved bow. Put the W/S on the bow about where you want it and center the oping window. Then move the two outer windows toward the rear of the boat. As you move the W/S you will see a point where the bottom of the windows sit flat or very close to flat in the bow skin. Slide the wing windows on a see what it looks like. If you like it, put some rubbery gasket on the bottom and nail it down. I used some 3/4" closed cell foam with stickum on one side I got at Home Depot. Hope that all made sense,

 

[GA_Boater]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

Oh - Welcome to the Starcraft drydock. If you have glass Qs, we might not be able to help with that but you can always post a thread in the Resto section. You got a boat, it says Starcraft on the side, welcome to the madness.

 

[starcraftkid]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

Those early hulls had no flotation, it wasn't required yet.
The decks were usually just screwed down to the tops of the fiberglass reinforcement tubes or 'stringers' if you wish to call them that.
The hulls were made from single layer woven mat, not blown glass over gell coat like more modern hulls. They were light, but very thin. They were very strong but like any boat they can be damaged if your overly careless. Drop the anchor or run up on a stump and your likely to bust through the hull. The forward area of the bow, ahead of your feet is generally just trapped air, which will provide some flotation but not like foam.
You mentioned Sea King boats, most of those were Starcraft built models, especially in those years. They were basically the identical boat in different colors. If yours is a painted hull it may well be a very early model, that was around the time that molded in color or gel coat boats started to appear. The top cap will be molded in color, the lower hull will be almost clear if you removed all the paint. The inside paint could be anything, after 52 years who knows what was done to it.
I've seen both one piece decks, as well as three piece decks that allowed the deck to be removed without removing the seats. The seat 'brackets' were glassed into the hull, but the seats were screwed down to wooden tabs on each side. The original seats were vinyl, foam, and plywood in two tone to match the hull. Yours would have been blue and white seats. They were not very convenient for fishing but they did ad a lot of strength to the boat. The front bench went side to side attaching to both sides of the boat. The rear sat only on the inside lip of the step in the hull, I believe the rear seat folded down. The rear seat was not all the way back, there was room to stand behind it.
Getting into the driver's seat meant climbing over the seat back. All passengers faced forward.

Those hulls were light, maybe even as light or close to that of a comparable aluminum boat. You won't need much motor.

The transom repair sounds like it should be rock solid. If the person doing the lay up knew enough to do it in stages so as not to end up with a big warped, overheated mess, it should be fine. Chances are it's stronger than the original.
As you said, its been used like that, so chances are if it were going to give out, it most likely would have failed already.

I had the Sea King version of that boat a few years ago, it was a very dry boat, the fact that its glass allowed them to form in a very functional bow shape. Best off, it'll go places that a full on V hull won't, mine would float in several inched of water.
I ran a 35hp Evinrude on my Sea King, it did about 28 mph on the speedo, I never checked it any other way but it was plenty fast for me. I suppose a good 20hp would do fine, I don't have much doubt it'll plane the boat, just so its not overloaded.

If it were mine, I'd just paint the deck, add some sand or anti skid grit to it and go fishing. The way I look at those old boats is that they lasted this long with usually the most minimal of care, so anything we do to them now will only make them better than they ever were.

Back when I redid the deck in my Sea King, I asked all around, (Long before I ever heard of iBoats), and found an old timer that did boat repairs and glass work down the shore. He told me to just by good exterior plywood and screw it down the way it was. He said not to attach it to the hull since the hull was so thin. He said that likely if I sanded and prepped the hull and proceeded to try to bond new glass to the hull, I'd likely either damage the thin hull or warp it from the heat of the resin curing.

 

[starcraftkid]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

I did some digging and found a few pics I had saved.
The first is of a 1963 Comet with its deck removed, you can see how the deck lies atop the inner glass lip. Its attached with screws, this one had some sort of felt or horse hair padding between the plywood deck and the round tubular supports.
The actual 'stringers' in these hulls are down the sides, above the deck, they form the strake or step where the original seats mounted.
Later models had wood in the gunwales, I don't believe the early models did. Nor did they have the foam strips molded into the underside of the deck or splashwell.

The later models had the decks glassed in place but there was no feathered edge, they were just 'glued' down with resin.
The older models had visible screws, and often gaps around the edge of the deck. The plywood wasn't coated or painted in any way on any that I've seen.
The depth of the under deck area got deeper in the later years, yours will be very shallow. They most likely didn't finish off the rear of the deck on some models since that was usually covered by a vinyl curtain or on some a pair of sliding doors. Models like the one shown had two drain plugs, one to drain the lower bilge area below the deck, and one to drain the upper hull. Yours should have only one, your deck and the bilge were not separate compartments or sealed from one another.

1960 was the first year for that style construction. According to the 1960 catalog, the flotation in those models was in the seat boxes, beneath each seat. So if the original seats are removed, so was the flotation. In early models many just had a trapped air compartment, some did use foam.

Pre 1960 models were often a combination of wood and glass, often with no splashwell, wooden seats, wooden rub rails, and exposed wood decks.

Your boat is in the first batch of what was to be the next generation Starcraft glass boats. Many changes came over the next few years but those older models were built to last.

Like stated above, if you can stand on the lower unit and the transom don't move, all should be just fine.
I wouldn't worry too much about the deck or how well its bonded to the hull, just so its been glassed over and water proofed, seal up any gaps, paint it and go fishing. If you want to add flotation, maybe add a large chunk of foam under the bow deck and maybe one under the splashwell. Other than that I'd have to say go with a set of back to back seats and put foam blocks in each seat. That hull may be a bit narrow though for twin back to back seats. Getting in between them may be a tight squeeze.

 

[jbcurt00]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

If the transom passes that ^^^ test, running it w/ a short shaft motor, or a too low long (AV plate too deep) shaft motor might be fine. Although the added leverage of a long shaft motor might generate more torque against the transom, if it supports your weight & you're satisfied that the repairs were sound, use it if you choose.

You asked about raising the transom height at some point, and to do that correctly in a fiberglass boat sounds like it's going to be more involved then you are interested in doing correctly. And now that the boat has had a fairly substantial 'repair' done from the outside, and had the wood transom replaced with all fiberglass, I suspect that raising the transom height is a fairly difficult proposition, esp given your description of it being like a rock.

That 3 panel windshield can be made to fit as posted above.

And as before, many of the details & pix you've posted lead me to believe that some of the work done on this boat may have been done in haste, for show, or in less then a diligent manner. If you've seen the pix, and believe otherwise, that may give you enough confidence in the sea worthiness of the boat. But with out being able to see the boat in person, crawl all over it, and do a thorough inspection, I am skeptical.

But all of that ^^^ is IMHO only. And the only reason I mentioned the Resto forum, where you started the other thread, might be a better location to get more feedback from the guys doing fiberglass repairs, is for the same reason's GA suggested you post a thread over there.

But also like GA said, it's got Starcraft on the side, so here's just fine. It's really up to you, the Mod's won't move it unless you ask them to.

 

[North Beach]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

Here's starcraft's explaination of the 60's Glass Boat and the specs for your boat. Please note the verbage about runabouts having either foam or air chambers for flotation and just the open boats having foam under the seats.




Also if you read thru most of the brochures from the 60's you'll see that Starcraft presented flotation as a safety (but I would guess more than likely a marketing ploy) feature in all their boats-even the models that did not meet the coast guard requirement. I do know that in 62 (I don't have the 61 brochure) they talk about sealing the glassed in plywood floor to the sides to create a flotation air chamber and talk about how it is screwed to the stringers for strucrural stability. Also they talk about the wood encapsulated transom in the 62. I'll throw that section up here for your use also.

 

[reelfishin]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

I owned that boat about two or three years ago.
The guy that did the glass work was a decent fiberglass guy, he fixes big rig fiberglass for a living. He got the boat from the original owner's family, who had run it till the old school 40hp nearly fell off it.

The deck is glassed in place, the transom was done just as stated above. From what I could tell its rock solid. The blue and white were repainted by the people he got it from, he had intended to repaint the whole boat, as did I but I sold it back to someone who claimed to be a relative of the original owner not long after getting it. The paint looked like department store paint, probably Rustoleum or something similar. The bottom was painted over top of bottom paint and was peeling off back then. The deck is one piece of 1/2" ACX, it was coated in poly resin and wrapped in light fiberglass mat twice then stuck in the boat using a mix of chopped glass and resin, and several screws to secure it in place. The edges were just gone over with resin and 4" strips of fiberglass cloth to keep there from being a gap to collect nasty things while fishing and to make sure no water got below the deck panel. The deck was stopped short of the transom the same as the original, this allowed for two 6 gallon metal gas tanks to fit longways under the splashwell. The original deck went to the transom only on each side, not in the middle, but that was a separate panel. It could well be added if you wanted but having the panel in there keeps you from being able to fit the fuel tank all the way back against the transom, thus it sticks out where you can trip on it.

I've always thought that the area in the bow ahead of the floor panel was trapped air for flotation in those boats too. I've cut up a few junk hulls and there's no wood in there, it's all glass. I also think the arched supports in the floor were formed over cardboard, which in most cases just rotted away over the years. It had no other purpose other than to support the glass while it cured.

I think the transom in that boat was done the way it was done simply because the person doing it had the material at hand to rebuilt it that way. His intention was to make sure it never rotted away again, and since the outer hull was damaged, using all fiberglass eliminated the need for that panel to be removed and replaced, it was just feathered back together making it all one panel.

That boat was for him and his kids, so I doubt he would have done anything dangerous to it. He used it for a while but I think he lost his license and in NJ that means no boat either. I think selling the boat was to pay for his fines.
When I sold the boat, the old transom trim and corner caps were still in the boat, but both corner caps were damaged and the transom top strip, which was left off after the repair was badly corroded where the motor sat. The ends were fine but they no longer fit the top of the transom since he now made the splashwell and transom one integral part. He filled the top edge with resin and glass fiber, and then finished it off with fiber filler. He repainted the transom area with what ever color he had mixed at work just so the glass repair was covered and sort of matched. If you notice the paint on the transom and about 10" around the sides is automotive paint, and well adhered the rest of the paint is soft and will peel off with your finger nail.

I think just one of the fiberglass panels he used in the transom would be strong enough, let alone filling it solid with them.
I think the reason the transom stayed at 15' was because the original motor was still being used. I got it sans motor, but had intended to run a 20 or 25hp on it. It just never happened and the boat got sold to make room for another project. By the looks of it its been in the water since I had it, the registration numbers are new.

Just a thought, if you convert that to teleflex steering, you could easily put flotation foam up under the gunwales. You would use pour in foam or you could cut and glue pink or blue insulation foam.

Good luck with it, it should have many more years of use left in it.

 

[screwloose]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

I was sort of thinking it may have been passed around a bit before I got it, two people told me they saw it on CL some time ago.

I decided today to move the boat to a better trailer, I put it on a newer Load Rite roller trailer. I figured with the low water levels at some of the lakes and river, it may come in handy.

One issue I came across today was a broken bow eye, while moving it from one trailer to another, while tightening up the winch, the bow eye snapped free of the threaded stud. The stud is still there but the cast aluminum eye popped off. No biggie, I got one around here somewhere.
The old stud backed right out once I crawled up inside and removed the nut.

I was sort of thinking that the deck and fiberglass work inside ended with the deck at the rear, but I noticed today, while the boat was hanging from a sling, that on the inside the drain plug is flush with the bottom of the boat, yet on the outside its 1 1/4" from the bottom of the hull. What I found after a really close look is that when they laid up the transom, they built up the rear bottom of the boat and feathered it into the transom on three sides. The area where the gas tanks sit has been reinforced and made super thick, apparently its the same construction as the transom.
I started to remove the old rub rail today, I found a few 1/2 cracks I need to stop and fix around the forward edges of the bow.
I also decided to get this thing weighed, just to be sure what I have here and to eliminate any concern about hidden water weight. What I found surprised me, this boat is nearly 80lbs lighter than the brochure states. The local CAT scales gave me 743 lbs for the hull and roller trailer, the trailer weighs 427 lbs, making the rest, 316lbs the weight of the boat. I guess two bass boat pedestals.
I can easily lift either end of this boat with one hand on the trailer. If the weather holds out this weekend I plan try to get the rub rail all done and maybe some paint on the deck.

 

[GA_Boater]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

Screw - That is some history reelfishin has up there. Sounds like the boat was re-built to last. It isn't often that PO's see an old boat again, at least not in the forums like this. reelfishin must be the iboats Starcraft broker, he also sold a Starchief to rheagler who has a thread here and recently completed his resto.

 

[starcraftkid]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

I was at Reelfishin's place a few times several years ago, he had a few dozen boats there, mostly Starcrafts.
Not to mention more motors and spare parts than I could count.

Those older Starcraft boats are super light, the type of trailer isn't very important since I doubt there will be much weight on any one roller if adjusted properly. That boat is probably as light or lighter than a comparable aluminum model now that its bench seats are gone.

If that boat were mine I'd probably start with getting some paint on that deck to protect it, then replace that rub rail and strip.
You will probably find that a 20 or 25hp motor will move that boat just fine with a light load, being that those were almost flat bottomed, they take very little power to move.

 

[screwloose]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

I was thinking today, if I have to replace the bow eye, which is no real big deal, should I also add two rear tie down eyes through the transom? I think these originally had handles back there, not eye hooks but I figured they may come in handy. However, I'll most likely just tie the boat down with a belly strap since now on the roller trailer the frame itself is several feet ahead of the transom. Only the roller bars extend to the transom area.

I was also considering using stainless steel U bolt style eye bolts rather than the original pot metal single post style that failed.

I also picked up a set of back to back seats in white and blue that will fit this boat, I figured this style seat will be less stress on the deck and hull. Plus I can add flotation foam under each seat.

As much as I don't like how carpet fades or hold moisture, I think either carpet or Nautolex is the ticket for the deck, paint will never last.
I've also thought about just making the carpet removable but I'm not sure on that yet.

One thing I found is that the hull is so thin it distorts as you sand it, just putting pressure on the lower hull with an orbital disc sander it bows inward. Its not 'soft', its just thin with nothing behind most areas to support it. In other words its not solid like the transom.
The majority of this hull is no thicker than a pizza box. In places where I removed the paint on the lower sides, the hull is amber/clear, not gel coated at all. The cap is also the same way. Every bit of this boat is painted.
The entire bottom, below the water line has cracked paint, sort of like the paint shrunk and cracked all over. The paint is very lightly adhered, it peels right off or comes off with a pressure washer.
Under the paint is bare fiberglass and resin, sort of amber or clear. No where on this boat is there any molded in color like on modern boats. Which I suppose is good since I won't have to worry about trying to buff the finish up, its just a matter of stripping it and repainting.

I plan to hang a 20hp Mercury on it tomorrow and give it a test run in the water just to see what it'll do, I'll also be checking for leaks, but I can't imagine there being any since I've been over just about every inch of this thing underneath already. Maybe some more of the paint will wash off.

Here's a pic of the paint on the underside:

 

[jbcurt00]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

Interesting, thin hull, no gelcoat, poor adhesion & failing paint. I'm pretty certain it didn't leave the SC factory that way...

If you are seeing a 'clear' amber or green fiberglass hull, that is as thin as you describe, it certainly sounds like the gelcoat was removed at some point.

BTW: If left uncovered, fiberglass degrades with exposure to UV. My 1960 FireFlite is thin, but there is gelcoat present.

Re-enforces my opinion about the quality of work done on the boat, and it's long term viability. No offense to Reelfish or anyone else that commented favorably about this boat & the work that was done on it. It's IMHO only, and in the absence of physical proof, my opinion is just that, my opinion & it likely won't change. They are like elbows, most everybody has 1 or 2 :redface:

Boat safely

 

[screwloose]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

In places where I blasted off the paint with a pressure washer, the fiberglass is shiny, but not colored, just smooth clear, amber colored. Its not the same color as the resin you buy in a can, but similar. Sort of a beer bottle brown/amber color. The same color as resin around the edges of the deck. I can't imagine that anyone would have removed every last inch of color from the inside and outside of this boat. There's no color to the hull even under the rub rail, or under the edge of the upper cap for that matter. Its as if it were molded in natural fiberglass and then painted from the factory. If it were faded or ground off, places like under the dash, under the edge of the cap, and under bolt on items would still have color.
The fiberglass is not gouged or ground on, its just thin, like they used a single layer of woven roven to lay up the hull in a mold.
I drove this morning to check out another older Starcraft that was in the newspaper for sale, its a 1961 model according to the title, that boat was gel coated in color, there was color under the bow deck, and on all parts made of glass. Mine has no color on anything that wasn't sprayed on.
You can even see in the pic above showing the cracked paint, that in between the cracks there's neutral resin color showing. Its sort of an ambler brown color.
If I put a drop light in the hull at night, all the areas where the paint is gone shows light through.

I can't fathom any of this being the work of an individual doing repairs, the entire hull would have to have been either remolded or stripped down bare and reassembled. That just isn't very likely.
I'd more think that the hull is an earlier version? Did they gel coat in color in 1959?
The brochure for 1960 states that the colors were "impregnated". But it makes no mention of it being Gelcoated in color.
Either way, there's no color to the lower hull at all, the top is blue but even the original blue is thin, but it don't blast of like the lower paint does. When I remove the top layer of blue paint, I can see a shiny blue surface below but that surface scratches like paint revealing clear fiberglass resin. On modern fiberglass, the gelcoat is deep, the color is as deep as the resin down to the glass fibers. On this the color is on top, like paint.

I have no intention of stripping the whole boat down, I'm just removing the loose paint and will repaint it once I find something that will stick to it.
From what RF posted above, it don't sound like the owner who did all the glass work did any paint work, and I have to agree, the paint looks old, while the deck and transom look very recent. The outside of the transom is painted with a texture finish, like the chip guard paint you see on the bottom edge of a modern car. That paint is well adhered and don't chip or wash off. He painted the transom all the way around the sides a ways. The blue in the splashwell is untouched, where they did work, its painted white like the outside. The inside of the transom is painted in what looks like white trunk paint or speckle paint. Its adhered well at the top but didn't stick to the glass work at the bottom near the bottom of the boat. Its either been affected by water laying there or it didn't stick to the resin and glass used to feather the transom into the bottom of the boat. They added considerable amounts of glass to both the bottom and sides that is well adhered to the new and old work.

Its been raining off an on all day here today so I won't be getting it to the water today, but my next step is to see what it does on the water with a small motor. My only concerns are how thin the hull is around the sides where your feet sit. The hull just seems like it should have more support on the sides. The tops of the gunwales are thin too, maybe 1/8" thick at best, and there's no support on the inside. The only support is the strip of wood that they are formed over. If you were to stand on one where the step pads are I have no doubt it would crush or fold inward. I will certainly remove the step pads, they serve no purpose at all.
The best way I can describe what I mean by the hull being flexible, is that it flexes like those plastic hulls by Coleman, like a Crawdad or similar. The glass isn't compromised in any way, its just thin. Which I'm sure is why this thing is so light. If you compare weights between early aluminum and glass hulls they're very close, and since mine is now without its bench seats its even lighter. The closest in size in aluminum would be an early Jet or Viscount, (370 and 425lbs), the Voyager is listed at 475lbs. Mine weighs in at 316lbs. Keep in mind that the wood bench seats, lower seat boxes, and upholstery are all removed and there's no floor covering at all. It was weighed at a local truck stop on the trailer, the trailer was weighed first empty and subtracted from the total boat and trailer combined weight. To me that seems like more than just the weight difference of just the seats, but not having seen them I can't say for certain.
I would have figured the weight to be closer to the factory specs unless more than just seats have been removed from this.

It was a bit of a surprise when I first realized that I could lift either end of this boat off the trailer with one hand.

 

[jbcurt00]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

Don't be surprised in what someone might do, or try to do, attempting to do repairs on their boats. if you find a boat that looks like it's had all of the gelcoat ground off for any reason.

See my thread about a 1961 Glaspar G3 I bought as a test bed & demo model for work.... The PO did all this damage:

Even the bow body lines have been unevenly ground off if you look thru the G3 pix I posted :facepalm: I have no idea what he was thinking or where he looked for advice, but apparently it sat in the front yard long enough for it to be a nuisance to his wife. It's a total wreck, which suited my purpose just fine. It will never again be launched or floated. Which is too bad, it could have been an amazing boat. The interior work & condition is worse...........

So nope, would not be surprised if similar was done to your's sometime in it's past...........

 

[screwloose]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

That Glasspar almost looks sandblasted?

On mine, the glass is shiny smooth where the paint came off, the inside is also painted.
If it were sanded off, or even sandblasted, there would still be someplace on the boat where they missed something.
I have a parts boat here from which I'm taking the rub rails, corner trim, and all the small parts to make mine 100%, that boat has a 1962 title. That entire cap is light blue, and the bottom white like mine, but the color is all the way though the glass, if I cut into the glass, which I have in several spots, its blue all the way through. Its painted white like mine on the inside but there's blue under the white speckle paint.
The deck is or was screwed in place.
It has more of those arched deck supports though, mine has only 4, this one has 7 of them. Its also just as thin or thinner than mine is.
The parts boat is super clean but hit something at high speed and the bottom of the hull has a 38" x 18" soft spot where the glass is like a rag, all broken apart. The hull however all over has the same flex that mine has. If I push on the hull, even where its not damaged, it flexes the same as if I pushed on the fender of my truck. On my last glass boat, a '78 Sea Ray, the glass was like stone, there was no flex. But that boat wasn't made with this cloth and resin, it was made up of resin and chopped strands and the hull was 1/4" thick in spots.

The color on the parts boat don't come off, it don't sand away. If I take fine sandpaper to the parts boat, I can sand off the dull finish and polish it right back up, on mine, any sanding at all balls up the paint on the paper leaving bare resin or maybe clear gel coat?

There's no doubt that the first coat of color on top is far more durable than the subsequent coats put on with a mop, but it still rubs right off. the lower hull appears to have only one coat of white, one coat of glossy, but wrinkled paint.

Anyhow, I did take the boat down to the lake today, I didn't take the 20hp, I took the 15hp, (with a 9.9hp cover), to a hp limited lake to test the hull today. I was surprised to find that it planed out just fine. Its not fast but faster than my 14' aluminum boat with that motor.
(the Voyager is no doubt much lighter and has a flatter bottom). It should do just fine with a 20hp, plus some better weight distribution than just a 20 gallon tank, deep cycle batter, and me sitting at the transom running a tiller motor. The thing actual felt pretty good on the water, all the flex I feel on the trailer is gone in the water, even the gunwales feel sturdier on the water. I guess its either the way the water supports the hull or the fact that the hull gives way under weight different on water.
I notice the same thing on a buddies new Mako, on the trailer the deck on that boat is like a trampoline under my weight, but feels rock solid on the water, and that boat is only two months old.
The pedestal seats are also just fine. They don't seem to flex or move much at all on the water, on the trailer they rock all over the place.
I did get some odd stares unloading a runabout into what is normally a bass lake with electric powered jon boats, but I didn't want to dump it in the fast moving river only to find out I needed more power to get back up stream.
However, I doubt even the 15hp would be an issue in the river.

I think my original thought about running all day on the water for cheap is now reinforced even more. I ran the boat about 6 miles, until it really started to downpour. (Even the bilge pump works). The boat didn't leak a drop, (Other than from the broken bow eye. ( I threaded in a plain eye hook in a hurry for today that was just laying there, some water came in through that hole at speed when I walked to the front of the boat under power. (Locked the motor on dead ahead at full throttle and moved forward to see how it rode with more weight up front).
I also like the roller trailer, it was super easy to load and unload, it took less than 3 minutes to load the boat and be off the ramp. Its so light, I could almost pull it on the trailer myself on that ramp.

My thinking on going today to test the boat was that since they were predicting rain, the ramp would be empty, I was right, there wasn't another sole on that lake. Not even a car in the parking lot. I left when the thunder started to get loud. The plastic windshield and no wiper will have to go, I got beat up running back across the lake to the dock running into the wind and rain.

After I got back home, of course the rain stopped, so I started replacing the trim pieces and getting them all to fit just right.

I have two gallons of white Ezpoxy paint from another project, I may just strip off the old paint and roll on a new coat of white, at least that way the bottom will be done and I can do the rest as I get time.

I want the bottom to be good and dry before setting it back down on the rollers. I'll do a test area with that paint to see if it adheres any better than the Rustoleum paint. It also should hold up better in the water. What ever the boat is painted with now almost melts in the water. I washed the boat the other day and most if no all of the last two peeling coats of blue washed off using just a car wash brush and garden hose.

A question on your Glasspar, if the fiberglass isn't structurally damaged, why couldn't that just be sprayed with a coat of resin or epoxy and painted just like you would do a car or truck? (Provided there isn't fibers showing through the surface).
I pretty much always though that gel coat was just a pigmented layer shot into the mold first, then they added the glass mat or chopped strand? If that's the case, the color layer is nothing more than pigmented resin?
If they did sand away the color, its not likely they sanded away all the resin?

I did a test patch on the parts boat I have here with a grinder, I have to really dig into it to get past the smooth surface finish to the point where I hit fibers. But on the parts boat I never hit clear glass, even down in the fibers its colored all the way through.

 

[screwloose]

Re: Just bought a 1960 Fiberglass Starcraft

I was thinking last night, I keep comparing this to other Starcraft hulls, and although the parts hull I here is supposedly also a Starcraft, (Titled as home made in 1974), maybe the boat here in my yard isn't made by Starcraft at all? Maybe someone along the line just used the numbers from a comparable Starcraft because that's what title they had on hand?
I don't have any really clear pics to compare to, the brochure sort of matches, the hull looks right...???

The one feature i haven't seen on any other Starcraft boats yet is the football shaped glove box opening in the middle of the dash.
Could it be maybe this isn't a Starcraft? Maybe made by Starcraft for a third party, thus the differences?
Anyone else have a pre '62 Voyager model or some better pics?

Also, there are no numbers on either boat, neither hull has Starcraft logos or badges. The parts hull however does have Starcraft embossed step pads. The step pads on this boat are plain white, no script.