1999 Longhorn Nautique Restoration Thread

Hey PN,

A couple months ago I posted in the new member section about a boat that was recently passed down to me. The official Nautique model is a 1999 Sport Nautique but we call it the "Longhorn Nautique" or "Ol' Horney". The reason being, in 99, my dad special ordered this boat from correct craft with a burnt orange color scheme and logos authorized by The University of Texas. Since taking delivery, my family has put over 4000 hours on this boat. As a result, the boat needs a lot of love. Now that the she is mine and after months of research and planning, I have officially begun restoring her. The goal is rebuild the boat better than when it left the factory while improving its performance and technology. Most importantly, the boat needs to remain tasteful. Here's a list of items we will be tackling this winter.

-The GT40 351 is the original numbers matching block (the engine has been overhauled twice in its lifetime but the block is the original). Engine will be rebuilt. Goal is 500 hp, 500 ft lbs, and maybe 60 mph with a 3-blade prop.

-The deck of the boat will be removed, all fiberglass will be properly fixed (lots of small repairs over the years, not all of them done right).

-New gelcoat over the entire deck, hull, and interior walls and floor will be sprayed.

-Complete Seakdek flooring will be installed. Floors, gunnel steps, interior walls, etc.

-Dash pod will be modified (after I make a mold of the original for future re-manufacturing ). It will be wrapped in a tan vinyl or marine leather of some sort with stitching.
    
-New gauges, switch, and radio panels with push button start built by New Wire Marine.
    
-New upholstery and new panels for every piece.

-Tower will be refurbished. There are some cracks and lots of holes from different speakers and lights throughout the years. Although, I have considered ordering a new tower from New Dimensions. We will see.
    
-Interior will be brought back to oem patterns but I will be adding some small details that should make it stand out when you look close. I'll also be incorporating an observer seat with flip down backrest for a Ski Nautique 206 so I can have more seating next to the driver. Lastly, I will be using a jump seat from a Ski Nautique 200 to add an additional seat behind the driver.
    
-Windshield, vents, and all metal parts throughout the boat including the engine support plates will be powder-coated black.
    
-All chrome will be restored.
    
-Ski pylon will be re-anodized.
    
-Complete JL Audio System with bow speakers.
    
-Full LED lighting.
    
-Perfect pass added (would love to go Zero Off but I dont want to mess with making a drive by wire throttle compatible with the Holley multi port fuel injection that will used on the engine).

Goal is to have this all done by May 2020 (I hope).

Here a couple photos of Ol' Horney in pre-restoration state:

Throughout the next couple months, I will be putting a couple items up for sale:

-Complete GT40 fuel injection system with complete harness, ECU, fuel system, injectors, new FCC high and low pressure components, etc. The whole package.
- 1.23: 1 40 series transmission
-Complete exhaust system from the manifolds back. Hull hugger muffler and down pipes are in great shape.
-Possibly an FCT2 tower

M3Fan wrote: Wow, awesome project. I love the color. Hopefully it goes back to being a "sport" Nautique graphically though the extent of the Longhorn fandom is truly impressive. New trailer too? Nice. Since this is an open checkbook restoration why not just sell the whole GT40 and put a modern marine bobtail in there like a PCM 6.0? All the trouble to rebuild a Ford that they stopped making nearly 20 years ago into something totally bespoke to troubleshoot down the road. Plus you get ZO capability right off the bat which is worth it 10x over, maybe less so for boarding sports than slalom but it's still really really nice.

Graphically, the boat will stay Longhorn Nautique because that is how it was shipped from Correct Craft.

I had gone back and forth on engine choices for months, believe me. I looked at ZR409, ZR450, new 427 with dart block, etc. First thing I looked at was price vs performance. With a new 80 series transmission and either of the ZR engines, I was about 7k higher than if I were to stick with my current engine or have a new 427 built. The second thing that I kept in mind is that this boat is priceless to the family and I wanted it be restoration original as close as possible while improving the boat. I realized that the engine in this boat is still the original block and I thought, "how cool would it be to turn this original numbers matching engine into to something amazing". Since this boat already has a long story and a lot of memories behind it, I decided to stick with having the gt40 rebuilt into something special that way the "original" engine is still with the boat. Best of all, the gt40 intake manifold will be reused so it will appear stock.

From a reliability stand point, I completely agree with you. This was a big concern of mine when weighing my options. After speaking with Prestige Motorsports, they were convinced they could build me something that would be able to have the crap beaten out of it and still run 1000+ hours with no issues. Part of that reliability comes from forged internals and roller components. From a air/fuel perspective, the 427 will have multi port fuel injection to keep everything consistent and smooth and will be dynoed and tuned prior to arriving in Texas. The cam that will go in the engine will be very mild and to prevent reversion. It shouldn't idle any different than a normal GT40.

Last thing I considered was zero off. This boat was the first boat I learned how to slalom, trick, and jump behind. Hell, I landed my first "plop" behind this boat. From boys 1 to collegiate, I had the opportunity to use perfect pass, stargazer, and zero off. While I really wanted the newest tech (zero off) I realized that I skied just fine with perfect pass when I was growing up. Now that perfectpass is GPS based, I imagine its gotten even better. Yes, it's not Zero Off accurate but this boat isnt going to be pulling any world records lol. Perfectpass was what came in the boat so that is what I am going back to.

Thanks for your reply!

The cylinder heads are made by Prestige. Check our their YouTube channel Prestige Motorsports. They do some pretty amazing work!

I like it. The new trailer looks nice as well.

I would listen to Joe as well.

DHMcFadin wrote:

Did you get caught in the "Tetris Challenge"-hype there…?

Awesome work!

Upon further clarification with Prestige, these are the heads that will be used:

AFR Cylinder Heads, Competition Porting, Aluminum, Assembled, 58cc Chamber, 195cc Intake, Ford, Small Block, Pair

Not sure why I wrote ARP.

JoeinNY wrote: DHMcFadin wrote: The cylinder heads are made by Prestige. Check our their YouTube channel Prestige Motorsports. They do some pretty amazing work! I hope the cylinder heads are in fact not made by Prestige. I just checked out their specs on crate engines - the 500 hp 427 is using a Dart head and they talk about it being fairly lopey idle as it requires an aggressive cam to reach 500 hp with that setup.   The 520 hp version uses an AFR head and a milder cam for a better idle and more hp across the board.   IMHO - That is the head/cam you are going to want not for the 20 hp but for just reliable well mannered boat use.   Worth the 10% premium over the dart headed engine as long was we are spending your money.   I would drop down to a 408 with AFR heads over a 427 with the Dart heads.   Actual installed hp with wet manifolds and some intake restriction might not reach 520 or even 500 but definitely a monster. Get the strongest prop shaft you can - and for my money avoid the ARE shafts for this application.

What shaft company would you recommend outside of ARE? I thought they were one of the best?

Windshield is disassembled and ready for powder coating!


This tool made completing this a breeze.

First of all, your rebuilt looks great. I would like to mention that I've never seen a built in ballast really work that well. It's a lot of work for marginal effect, plus you have to deal with long term issue like leaking. The floor space under the gunnels really make the boat feel more spacious. If you're really looking nimble ballast, I would recommend (1) 800 pound bag in the rear run by a reversible pump. (Look at Sumo Sac Long 800 as this fits almost perfect in the rear hatch.)

I won't derail your thread too much here. I owned a 99 Sport for a few years and familiar with the ballast needs for the boat. For a basic wakeboard wake I would do the following:

First, if you have the stock ballast tanks in the rear, consider removing them. They don't really hold enough weight to produce a nice wake and they take up a lot of space. Just put the sumo sac (800 long) in the rear and it opens up the whole rear locker when its not in use, Second, if you don't plan to use the ski locker, add a second bag there. Install two reversible pumps in the rear locker. If it were me, I wouldn't even use the ballast gauges. If you're making a new mold, just remove them completely. On the other hand, I know some people really want to restore things to original. To each their own.

sport1999 wrote: I won't derail your thread too much here. I owned a 99 Sport for a few years and familiar with the ballast needs for the boat. For a basic wakeboard wake I would do the following: First, if you have the stock ballast tanks in the rear, consider removing them. They don't really hold enough weight to produce a nice wake and they take up a lot of space. Just put the sumo sac (800 long) in the rear and it opens up the whole rear locker when its not in use, Second, if you don't plan to use the ski locker, add a second bag there. Install two reversible pumps in the rear locker. If it were me, I wouldn't even use the ballast gauges. If you're making a new mold, just remove them completely. On the other hand, I know some people really want to restore things to original. To each their own.

I completely agree with you, again, I not sure why I am so set on using gauges to monitor my ballast but my preference is beginning to waver. You are completely right, bags would be much easier to deal with and I could take much better advantage of the space I have. I think I will probably end up going to bags at the end of this deal. Cheaper and easier.

Another piece of the puzzle has arrived. In my first post, my plan for gauges was to have Livorsi create some custom instruments with the hope the classic Nautiques logo could be incorporated on the gauge face. Unfortunately that couldn't be done due to copyright. I realized that since I am running a Holley EFI system on this new engine, I could utilize their EFI Pro Dash 12.3". It's built for rugged environments, is water resistant, completely plug and play with one cable, and has an integrated GPS speedo. It would also show everything analog and NMEA 2000 gauges would and more. It also offers a variety of different input and outputs including digital switches and potentially incorporating depth sender data into it (I hope this is the case). While I was pretty sure I wanted to stick with the classic oem dash look, I realized that this boat is not a perfect period correct restoration. It's a resto-mod. Part of that is incorporating new technologies. The Pro Dash stays with this trend. Best of all, I can incorporate as many Nautique logos as I want.

Since my new dash will be made out of fiberglass, it will be fairly straight forward to mold and flush mount this screen into the dash while maintaining the OEM shape, bezel, and matching overlays like the OEM dash. I would also make the screen frame-less so all of the gloss black surrounding the screen would be covered up. The only step from here is figure out what Perfect Pass gauge I will be using. It will most likely be the rectangular gauge face they sell. I will disassemble it and then flush mount it into the dash like the Pro Dash. I may re-solder the Perfect Pass settings buttons to a different place on the dash if it's possible. I am thinking I will flush mount it below the gauge cluster where the oem tach and ballast gauges were. Maintaining the same frame-less approach. We will see on this.

What are y'alls thoughts?

DHMcFadin wrote: What are y'alls thoughts?

If you're going with a custom dash check out the BFM build on N3 Boatworks social media pages or ask Mark for some additional pics. They deleted the dash of their BFN all together and it looks surprisingly nice. Might be a possibility for what you're trying to accomplish.

I have definitely seen that! Thanks for the reminder! I am still brainstorming, definitely a good possibility for a super clean look.