Classic Australian Wooden Power Boat Association

Gotta love the Yanks. Here is a great story of a restoration - http://www.woodyboater.com/classic-boats/bb/ But they replaced all the frames, and the bottom, the deck beams and then the deck. Presumably they kept the engine, hardware and running gear. So they call it a complete restoration. Or should it be a new boat?

What do others think?

Bob

(Semantics aside, this is a great woodie and looks absolutely fantastic.)

Bob

This is the American way. They take an old wooden boat and pull it apart and start from scratch, generally using the original frames as templates to make new ones. During the process they will select a piece or several pieces or lots of pieces of the old one which is/are still in good nick and put that back in the boat. this accepted as a restoration.

In the American Power Boat Association vintage class there are four levels of acceptance for the class:

a/ The original boat

b/ A restoration of the original boat.

c/ A brand new version of the original boat.

d/ A boat which has been built in the spirit of vintage to reflect a previous era.

My boat fits section d to reflect a Ted Jones style rear seat hydro of the 50's and 60's.

Spook

The yanks for years couldnt cope with patina therefore a resto is merely screwing the old data plate onto a new boat. Over the last few years the penny has dropped and now original untouched and the term I hate "barn finds" have become the premium collectable. Too bad most of the original survivors are gone.
Alfra if given to a so called restorer in vic woukd have certainly been destroyed as they claimed the hull couldnt be saved its only use being a pattern.
I have saved 90% of the original timber in her only replacing the bottom and some stringers and using mainly traditional fastenings and techniques.
The boat is aging nicely covered In dust. By the time she hits the water she will look her 85 years splits defects and all.

Interesting article Bob, that boat seems to fit somewhere between (b) and (c) on Spooks scale. I couldn't help but marvel at the amount of boats Chris Craft were churning out even during 1940-41 when the USA were confronted with being drawn into WWII. Glenn in Townsville would probably be the person to elaborate on the Chris Craft story......(over to you Glenn )

They certainly seemed to have o monopoly on all the available Mahogany. Maybe it is because of them that there is such a shortage now!

Jon , I like to read all your posts and have a few laughs but don't like posting , my Chris -Craft project at the moment is a B or as Dave P said a barn find , with all the new glues & apoxys going in the restos , I would hate to restore a molested boat, in WW2 Chris-Craft had 4or 5 factory's running.