looking for ideas and opinions on old runabout

[jwilkey84]

My buddy and I went on a mission to look at an older runabout to see if we could use some parts off the motor. Well to make a long story short, the motor wasn't what we thought it was, but the owner saw us looking at it from the road with binoculars, and approached us. He said, go take a good look at the whole boat and then come to the house and I'll make you a deal if you are interested. We looked it over and decided it didn't look too bad, so we went to the house and before we knew it we were dragging it home for $20, yes I said $20!! My wife was not happy but that's usual. The tires on the trailer even had air in them! The boat is a 70's (guess) shell lake runabout 14' long with a 72' johnson 20hp long shaft with electric start. I took the motor off and replaced it with a 83' johnson 50hp. We just had time to take it out one time befor the water froze here in Iowa, but we are looking forward to next summer and all kinds of fun now that we have a boat that can pull a skier. (last year we used my 1965 arkansas traveler 14' aluminum fishing boat with a 40hp tiller, and it would pull us but everyone at the lake got a good laugh out of us, but we like the attention) There are some things we want to do to the boat. We want to paint it up like the dukes of hazard car, but I was wanting some info on how to go about something like that. Can I just go to walmart and get some orange spray paint and call it good enough? Or is it illegal to not use paint that is not safe for the water ecosystem? There is also some real ruff stuff stuck to the bottom side of the boat, how do I get that off? Can I start scraping it with a putty knife or will that hurt the boat? Then can I buff the whole boat with an automotive buffer and some wax? Just looking for some ideas and laugs as we prepare for a really fun filled summer on a $20 ski boat, painted like the general lee, and also equipped with a train air horn that I have located. If you think this sounds redneck, it is, we are in southern Iowa, but it sure is fun. How can you go wrong for $20?!

 

[Lakester]

Re: looking for ideas and opinions on old runabout

hello,

all good ideas, especially the orange paint. lol and concerns... but

FIRST thing u should do is:

post up a pix so we all... can see it, too.

regards
lakester

 

[Solittle]

Re: looking for ideas and opinions on old runabout

You can scrape, sand, buff, paint, polish, cuss and fuss all you want. It is your boat (I'm sure you got a title & insurance - right?).

If you have specific questions - a picture or two would help. Have fun!

 

[jwilkey84]

Re: looking for ideas and opinions on old runabout

title and insurance are on the way. The boat was last registered in 2005, and it appears it is pretty sturdy and that kind of stuff. It is just faded and dull looking and I was wondering what the general practice to make it shine was. I mean, will turtle wax be the ticket, or do I need to buff and then polish. Is there an order of operations when it comes to bringing life back to fiberglass appearance? BTW has anyone heard of a shell lake boat?

 

[tashasdaddy]

Re: looking for ideas and opinions on old runabout

i've heard of Shell Lake boats, but never seen one. you can go cheap of the paint, as i said in the email, or you could spend thousands on that expensive paint.

you can up load to a free service like photobucket.com then you choose the pictures you want( clik the little box at the bottom left of the picture) scrool to the bottom of the page, clik generate html, it will take you to the next page, scroll down to thumb nails clik on that and copy, then insert it into your post.

also if you are planing on posting pictures, you can use the Blue post reply or the go advanced, manage attachments, there you can upload , directly from your computer. besure you pictures have been resized to fit the format. 640x480 max.