72 Promo Progress

Looks great! Good luck in the new warehouse!!

Gary S wrote: Just what is it with these guy's who have these "warehouses" ? They seem to have quite a few boats, just who are they hiding them from? " Oh that one it's not another I've had that one for a long time"

Gary,
I find it a better to hide, ...err,..... I mean store, my boats in various locations. Lets see, right now I have boats in 3 barns and a couple of garages. (I think)

been a while...

So much has happened on this boat and it’s a little embarrassing how badly I’ve neglected this thread.    Here’s an initial update on where this project has been over the last few years. It’s still a work in progress but I’ve taken major steps to this boat being presentable and functional.

Most of the boat was wet sanded and buffed while trying to avoid the original painted graphics. Repainting the letters won’t happen for a few years since I’m starting to enjoy showing off the history of this boat. She shined up well and the color came back nicely. Some of these pictures go as far back as 2013!

Transom & platform before


Transom during


Platform refinish


Blood, sweat and years


Shined up and ready for Pinkham Point


At some point, this boat was refreshed cosmetically with carpet on the floor, grey vinyl and a platform. Fortunately for me, they took the time to remove all the foam under the floor. For the most part, this preserved the stringers from major rot problems but not everything was sealed properly.

My project of cutting a new floor had now grown to grinding, treating and covering almost all the stringers. Add in new pylon and floor supports and I wasn’t too far from an entire stringer job, which made it hard to determine where to stop.    

Overall, this boat is really solid considering it’s age and previous life. I’m sure it will last many more years considering it’s mostly a trailer queen these days.

Once everything was structurally sound, I cut an entirely new floor for the boat. Just for fun I did this process twice. Once with ¾” ply, which was overkill and a horrible fit, and then again with 5/8” which was a much better choice. Wrapping the floor in vinyl really transformed the look of this boat.   I still need to make ski pocket sides and wrap them in vinyl, which will hopefully happen this summer.

Since we finally had the boat back together it only made sense to drag it hall way across the country and tear it apart again, right? That'll have to wait for another post but I promise lots of pics!

C-Bass wrote: Love the copper tips. Our 67 has them as well and I was looking into something like Everbrite that will keep them nice and shiny. Otherwise they just tarnish in a matter of days/weeks.

Penny Brite will clean them up if they get tarnished, I would probably pop them off first, don't know what that stuff would do to the hull.

Looking good Chris, can't wait for more pics.

All this Promo activity gave me some motivation to update this thread. Way overdue for the rest of this story and an update on my current progress. I left off just before our trip to Lake Norman, Pinkham Point and the world famous BBC. I’ll do my best to give everyone the highlights of this crazy/awesome week.

Luckily for PicturePat and I, the drive out and back was uneventful and the original tires from the PO made two more cross country trips!

Our mission for the week was to pull the original 318 and replace with a fresh 340 in time for the Pinkham Point mini reunion! Why remove a perfectly good, strong running 318? Well, Chrysler stuff is cool and our good friend ReidP happened to come across a pair of 340’s. He wasn’t going to let JMurph run away with the “Fastest 72 Promo” on earth award. Challenge accepted.

Gary was ready for us as we pulled into the BBC and after catching up for a few minutes parts were flying and the 318 was out. Over the next few days Gary, PicturePat and I logged some serious hours getting everything pulled, cleaned up and swapped over to the new 340. For the most part, everything wen’t as planned with very little re-engineering/rednecking. I came prepared with new prop, shaft, strut bearing, damper and a truck load of other little things the boat still needed.














I can’t stress how awesome Gary and Reid were through this process. It was a blast playing Gary’s sidekick assembling the motor and putting the boat back together. Can’t thank him enough for all his help and patience getting this boat back on the water.

As things started to come together some other CCFans started showing up for the Pinkham Point mini. Tim Morfoot showed up and offered to install the new ACME 540 and check out all the running gear. Mike, Joe and Tim helped with quality control as we started the break-in process on the 340. Not to mention everyone helping with all the small details and final assembly of the interior.








Other than some minor plumbing issues and the expertise of Tim Benjamin, the break in process went as planned. Here’s a quick video during the 20 min initial run.



I swear if we would have had a film crew on-site Reid would have a hit show on Velocity. With the cool nature of the project, short timeline and all the contributors (characters) we would have had a great pilot episode! Overall, our time at the BBC was worth the trip alone but the fun was just getting started and we headed to Pinkham Point for for a test run and awesome weekend with our CCF buds.

Joe captained the Promo for the initial lake test. Things were going really well for the first 10 minutes. Unfortunately we didn’t make it back under our own power due a sticky float. We headed back to the dock, towed in by Miss Scarlet, and I was headed for my first carter carb rebuild lesson.







After the carb cleaning everything seemed to be ready for a few speed runs. Joe showed us the ropes and we all took turns beating on the boat for the next hour. Everything went as planned and we were ready to enjoy the fruits of our labor, cool boats, beer and buds.

Tim Video


To anyone reading this – don’t ever pass up the opportunity to make the Pinkham Point Mini Reunion. We had a great time getting to know new CCFans and re-connecting with some of our existing “internet buddies” over the weekend. Here’s a few pics of the fun had that weekend.













One highlight of the weekend was the “Dos Promos” race and photo shoot. We never did put a GPS on the 340 Promo but the Chrysler Crew prevailed in the end! Here's some pics of us running the two boats together. I can’t imagine two of these boats have been together since they were built and running tournaments back in the 70’s. Thanks to PicturePat for finally coughing up some Dos Promos pics!















Unfortunately, the fun had to come to an end at some point. If not for Zoe and Maddox waiting for me at home I’m not sure I would have ever left! Although I need to thank a long list of people for helping me with this project there’s two that stick out in my mind.

Reid and Laurie – I can’t thank you guys enough for your generosity, help and hospitality. I always think of you guys as we continue to work on this boat and enjoy it with our family.

Gary – You’re the man! I’ll repeat myself – I can’t thank you enough for being patient with me and sharing your expertise. Hanging in the BBC was a great reprieve from sitting behind a desk. Looking forward to seeing you and Sam at a CCF event in the future.

All major projects are nearing completion and the hard work seems to be done. We've been enjoying the heck out of this boat since our visit to NC and it's performed flawlessly! We've finally located a reputable vinyl shop locally so the interior should be done this winter along with a few other cosmetic updates. Hopefully I can get this thing ready for a nice long run down the St. Johns River or the Dora Canal next spring!

Very nice write up Chris! You must have threatened Picture Pat in order for him to cough up the pictures. Those are great!

+1 on that Zach. We just need to find as many of these Promo's as we can and get them into CCFans hands...I for one would add a Promo to the Morfleet of boats. They are just too cool! Keep up the good work Chris and we'll look forward to seeing the updated Marrs Promo at "The Ruckus"

There's the Arkansas basketcase that was for sale, then he came on here and is fixing it up, can't think of his name. There's a few in the Diaries.

tryan
72stang
JMurph
storm34
reidp/TRBenj/JoeinNY/Got Tiques
Frankenotter

I've never heard anything from an official source but my guess is 10-15. Seems like 20 would be a crazy amount of boats for 1972.

Art??

Nice story and what great looking boats. Now I need to make the short trip over for a ride/drive!

Oh man. Reid is about to become my best friend and he doesn't even know it yet!

Beautiful job guys! I cant wait to get a bunch of these things together some day. In my head, I'm shooting for Green Lake 2019 as a worst case scenario.

Great thread, what a beauty!

On to winter projects and the 72 Promo is enjoying the 65 degree weather in the shop. Currently in the 20's here in Iowa.    

First order of business was to finish up the trailer project which includes proper black bunk carpet, orange pin stripe and some baby moons. I'm still looking for the right orange pin strip so if anyone has suggestions they'd be much appreciated. I'm thinking 1/8" wide would do the trick.

Here's a few pictures of the trailer project. But first.....One last ride before winterization.







Ok, on to the projects....Temporary carpet removed (old stage carpet). Ready for black bunk carpet!


One side down. FWIW - I noticed Ramlin adds a strip of carpet on top of their bunks so decided to do the same on this project. Grey carpet came from the 01's old Magnum trailer.


Re-painting Axle, springs and misc hardware.


Ready for baby moons, pin stripe and a promo!


Looks much better!




While I'm waiting to find a few trailer items I decided to start on the graphics restoration. It all started with replacing the MA registration but I couldn't resist cleaning up everything else.

The vinyl boot stripe was in pretty rough shape and the PO had touched up a lot of blemishes with paint. I stripped everything with the 3M eraser wheel and will wetsand off the remaining paint. Currently planning to re-paint the boot stripe along with the letters.

I would love to see one of these boats roll off the assembly line with the bright orange!


There was a lot more paint than I expected. Here you can see the remnants after the vinyl was removed.


Cleaned up and ready for paint.


My plan is to get all the prep work done before the end of next week in hopes of re-painting everything between Christmas and New Years. The letters currently have light brush marks and I have no reason to believe it's not factory so we'll be duplicating this look instead of spraying.

I'm waiting to remove the American Flag and Cypress Gardens decals until I can find a good source for placements. There's no telling if the CG decal was original but I'm concerned the gel color will be much lighter if removed. JMurph's promo has the CG decal....but the AZ promo showed no signs of either decal. At this point I'll plan to replace it unless there's concrete evidence it's not original and the gel isn't too faded underneath.



Cousin Donal - any chance you have a few NOS laying around with your other Cypress Gardens paraphernalia?

Duane in Indy wrote:    Should be relatively easy to mask off the lettering since it is all there.

Chris,
I agree but when you wet sand and or buff, be careful to leave some of the original graphics for masking. When the time comes, you'll need some of this - great product!!

Too bad.....that stuff would be worth millions these days! All kidding aside, Zach might have found a solution.

If anyone needs Cypress Gardens decals for their wood ski restoration or promo speak up now so we know how many to order!