72 Promo Progress

With winter setting in I figure everyone needs something to read/pics to look at to help pass the oncoming winter blues. I've slowly been working on this Promo for about a year but have been terrible about sharing the project and any progress.

As many of you know, I purchased this 1972 National Towboat last summer with a whole lot of Tim Benjamin's help. CCFan does it again He was able to make it run really nice before I took possession at the 2012 CT mini.

We racked up close to 10 hours on the old girl that weekend towing trick skiers, retro slalom runs and a few speed runs where she ran a stout 48.1 mph. She spent the rest of the summer on Lake Diamondhead and at our Power Boat Club drawing plenty of attention. Here's a few pictures of us enjoying the CT Mini and few of our starting point. I'll continue to update this thread over the next few days in hopes of getting updated to where it sits now.

Tim Moorfoot's retro run! Wood slalom and a ski belt!


Reidp carving $ signs in Tyler Lake


PicturePat doing some of the same


In good company!


Our starting point when we got her back to IA. She certainly lived up up to her name, The Orange Peel, but not for too long!







I started with just the wheel and 3m which worked fine on the deck and above the black boot stripe. Since there was substantial patina under the stripe I put PicturePat to work wetsanding 600/800/1000. This removed most of the small surface scratches in the gel and brought the color back to match everything else. A little work with the wheel and she looks great!







The transom isn't quite done and we're planning to buff the bottom next spring when we get the boat up in the air at the club. I'll post some other progress on this boat if I get some free time today or this weekend.

One of the first things I noticed too Zach,check out the Correct Craft decal on there also. The work place is nice too!

Looks really nice, Chris.

Chris, are those 2x8s? I need to build something similar to that for the orange boat so I can finish the trailer properly. (probably should get the boat running first ha).

Alan, I have already been on Chris about that ;). My buddy I town has access to a plane maybe we can fly a 6 pass out of Indy to Mars nearest airport!

Did the trips to GL and Lake James in the Bounder this summer, had forgotten how much fun that is so we're up for a couple of outings next summer for sure. Especially if we get a couple extras to tag along and split gas!!! ROAD TRIP!

That things just an old piece of junk. It doesn't even have a tower. Part it out and move on.

Yaaaaaayyyy, a thread to get me through the winter!!! Thanks Chris!

Keep the pictures coming... At a moderate rate ey, cause still five months before Yasmine comes out of winter storage...

Awesome boat and awesome cradle and nice shop!

The Iowa get together sounds like fun............and close. Let us know Chris. Should I bring a baby sitter?

I got family in Perry, Iowa other than my CCFan one so I might be in for an Iowa mini. Skiing on the Des Moines river is on the bucket list so why the heck not? (Not really but it sounded good.)

With PicturePat heading the charge on the hull sides I started investigating the new floor and stringers.

At some point the boat was 'renovated' to have the creature comforts of a newer ski boat. This was probably when the boat received carpet, newer style vinyl on the seats and motor box and some other updated items. It's going back to original with the yellow seat vinyl and will receive Nautolex vinyl on the floor and I've been slowly collecting original parts which I'll save for another post.

Original back seat in great shape with newer vinyl on the engine cover and front seats.



First thing we did at Tim's was to look for original orange gel on the engine cover. It's still there but needs some TLC and an Airguide gauge.



We knew the boat was solid from it's time up in CT and after using the boat the remainder of the summer. Although stringers seemed solid, we knew the floor would need to be replaced.

Since the foam was removed some time ago I was pretty confident we wouldn't be doing any major replacing. What we found were really solid primaries and secondaries with limited rot in the exhaust cavities. The PO had also removed the bulkheads and replaced a few floor supports which were done pretty well.

Closed cell foam had been cut and used to fill the stringer cavities and create the air box which was a good idea but poorly executed in regards to how they covered the foam. The glass came out with one swing of the hammer so we're going to replace with some thin ply covered with vinyl for the top of the air box. Haven't finalized how to fasten this down but I was thinking of glassing at a few blocks on the hull sides so we can screw the top down.

Air box before


Remnants of the air box


I'm going to put these two bulkheads back in to support the blower/bilge hoses, wiring and steering cable. This will also slow down whatever water does enter the bilge and keep everything organized.



The stringers were cleaned up of any delaminate glass (scored with a grinder back to a good bond) and then treated with CPES, and a few layers of cloth and mat. There was some rot around the exhaust cavity which isn't structural for the hull or floor so I cut down the top/soft portion, treated with CPES and wrapped in glass. I don't have any great photos of this yet but when I get back on the boat over the holidays I'll be sure to grab some pictures. Overall, it's very solid and will serve us well until it's re-strung in the future.

I still have a few drain holes to drill in the primaries and secondaries so water can flow freely between the cavities. After pulling everything apart, I'm thinking the best places for these will be by the rear motor mounts and under the front seats which is the lowest point in the hull.    

The new floor will be a bit thicker due to the lack of a foam sub floor underneath. Everything will be removable for future maintenance, cleaning of the bilge and the ability to change out the foam in the nose in the future.

Here's a before picture of the floor which clearly needs replaced.



And a shot from the original ad showing the grey carpet.


New floor dry fit and ready for routing, sealing and vinyl.


At this point, I have everything to finish up the floor and cosmetics inside except the floor "T" molding trim, ski pocket trim and yellow vinyl for the new seat skins and ski pockets.

I also noticed a weird clunking noise when I was working on the floor. Reid had driven the boat and thought it was shifting funny into reverse. Turns out the coupler wasn't fit to the shaft and was being held only by the set screws which had been severely hogged out. Engaging in forward was smooth as silk, but anytime reverse was engaged it would slam the set screws thus hogging them out even further. We'll fix this with a new double taper shaft and cut down the old shaft for the Avocado Queen.

Here's a video of the play in the coupler. (insert shaft jokes below)

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The port stern cushion is bacerds.

Deeno - you're right. Original bases and seat frames were re-skinned. We're going with something like this up front....

JMurph's boat...


Backseat cushions will have a zipper on the back..not the bottom. Both top and bottom will be pleated so we can flip them over if need be.

HW - Nice catch! That's from the PO's CL pictures.

Yellow on orange is the coolest thing ever. Makes me think of candy corn haha.

That shaft moves awfully freely haha. The one in the Skylark was pretty loose and only held in by the set screws as well.

You're doing some mighty fine looking wood work there Mr. Mars.
Now go take care of that baby!

I figured they had to come form you.

Chris, she's looking good. How are you going to attach the floor?

Some pretty good forecasting there.