Greetings, Virgin Member and Poster

I think your boat has a doppelganger floating around out there. A 79 Tique from Jacksonville with a 351 and it's 19 ft long too. Click on the link below 

Things don't often disappear from the Diaries/ For Sale listings. It also in the For Sale section with some different wording.

Good looking boat.......and aluminum trailer

I hope the engine box was just hiding in the picture
 

Gary,

Thank you for your kind words today.

Get that dial indicator out and check the shaft. The max TIR is .003 so you can't see it by eye. Aft of the strut is were a bend will produce the worst vibration. 

Why do you feel the cam is bad? Was the PO using a non ZDDP oil?

I'll see if I can dig up some vent bracket pictures. I did post them for another member but when CCfan was hacked, we lost almost all the pictures. I'll need to resurrect a old laptop to see if the pictures are on it. 

I agree on the performance evaluation.  I am not able to accelerate fully yet due to the harsh vibration, but for 220hp in a 1600 pound boat, it did at least seem to want to pull good for how far I was daring to go on it the one time I did so far.  

I'd be OK on buying a used PCM 1.23 reduction trans and making it work, but only if I would be able to set the same driveshaft angle with it via mount adjustment, etc...., and fitting a larger prop, which I don't think can be done on a Tique?  I have to search and measure.  On the engine uprate, it would really only be if I find a wiped out camshaft on the 302.  I'm an engine guy and like to do builds.  

Thanks again, more commentary welcome.  

I purchased a boat from your For Sale section, the $3,000 Jacksonville, FL one (ad has been taken down).  Drove from MI to grab it.    1979 Tique, a few mis-labelings in the post.  Owner said was 19' and he measured it out to be such not including the swim platform and that engine is a 351.  Went in knowing for a Tique neither of those were true, and of course boat turned out to be 16' and 302.  No prob.  I really just wanted a clean hull exterior, complete stock teak swim platform, and the older vent type windshield, which this all had 3, plus had a nice newer aluminum trailer.  Engine and interior did not matter, but those are mostly decent as well.  It was stated that it is going to need a floor and possible stringers.  She's $5k less than what they are asking in MI so we're good.    

Did a test run on the trailer once back and all seemed well.  Engine fired instantly and ran very smooth with zero blow-by, likely low hour.  Hour meter shows 41hrs and works but is the only loose gauge in the dash, so........  Test run in the water also showed everything to work decent, trans, cooling, etc.....  Steering is stiff and got stiffer during the test run, took 2 hands to steer it back onto the trailer.  Boat has a really bad vibration that is not felt at low RPM, yet mid throttle is very prevalent, and full throttle can not really even be attempted in fear of something breaking, it is that bad.  Owner said no vibrations, yeah OK, not true, but can be fixed.  Prop looks absolutely perfect, but will pull and send that in to be checked.  Will then check strut bushing and put a dial indicator on the shaft at different positions.  But, it spins straight to the naked eye.  I know even a little out can cause big vibes.  I also need to check engine compression on all 8 cylinders and rocker arm travel for all 16, as my guess so far would be that some of the flat tappet cam lobes may be wiped out from modern oils, as the vibration seems almost more tied to engine load rather than RPM, so could be misfire.  TBD, I'll find it.        

If she needs a cam, I may go against the grain here and do up a late model Vortec 350/383 in reverse rotation.  Would love to add the 1.23 trans and build the engine as conventional LH rotation, but have not studied deep yet if there is enough room, engine mount travel available to do so, etc.....  I need to search, but has anybody done such to add a reduction trans in place of the 1:1?  If so, are you just shortening the prop shaft, or pushing the prop closer to the rudder?  If go to larger engine, just stick with what I have and go a little steeper on prop pitch?  I don't think you can fit a larger diameter prop in the space occupied by the original one on a Tique hull?  I have lots to study there, but very much welcome any and all of your experience there.  I can really understand the desire to keep the RH engine rotation or at least the prop spinning that way, that narrow hull does really pitch when the throttle is poured on.  

On the reverse rotation roller cam Vortec build, seems nearly non-existent for mass production.  I did find a cam gear company that did make a gear-gear timing set for the step nose GM roller cam, but it has long been out of production, and seemingly none left in the US.  I was able to find a distributor outside of the US that had 4 of these timing sets in stock, so I purchased all of them.  Keep one and resell the rest.  All of the big cam companies surprisingly told me to they had no interest in grinding me a reverse firing order camshaft, but I did find a smaller hi tech place that does specialize in it and said they can do whatever I want, including running it all in reverse like Ford does with a conventional timing chain, but then you have to deal with the down thrust on the distributor, which I did not want to chase just because I don't know if there are any solutions for that, so I'd stick with standard rotation cam with reversed firing order, flip the pistons, reverse polish the crank, and get crank seals with the correct sipe direction for reverse crank rotation.  Good thing an LS oil pump is crank driven and can't go backwards, otherwise I'd be going that way.  Could always do it as dry sump though!      

I'm going to pull the floor this winter over Christmas break.  The floor actually seems to be in good shape, but the outer stringers (secondary ones?) are about as hard as wet newspaper, due to the fiberglass floor coating cracking at the 90 degree corner about the secondary stringer.  Will inspect the main engine stringers as well and possible do them if needed once in that far.  Seal it all up good and have a nice runner for several more decades.  I do have some stringer questions, like why they are scalloped out at the trans mounts, only to have the trans mounts sit atop and small plywood block to bring them back up to level with the rest of the stringer.  Was this to accommodate the GM powertrain?

Love the hull exterior being all era correct.  Will go more modern colors on the interior, gray, something, apology.  Going to make spotter seat the more useful L shape.  Looking forward to running this boat for a very long time.  I usually keep my stuff until it literally cracks in half.

I have not searched everything yet, but if anybody has a go-to source or the part numbers for common items, I am looking to replace all 3 cables once the floor is up: steering, shift, and throttle.  They are cheap and the boat will be expected to perform reliably every weekend during the summers, including student tow boat driver training (my 15 year old daughter).  Need to confirm steering stiffness is just the cable and not the helm or rudder shaft.  Shift and throttle feel great but will be renewed anyway.  

Ski pylon is just a little loose, seems there is a thin sheet metal plate that secures it to the floor board from stinger to stringer?  Not sure if that is stock, but if so, I'll redo the same thing, just in aluminum or stainless.  Surprised that plate was just conventional steel?

Open ears to which dripless prop shaft seal is favorited for those that have used them.  I also need to place a parts wanted ad, I am in need of the lower vent windshield slide lock bracketry hardware.  Has anybody made something other than just replace with same?  Scared these may be hard to locate, they seem frail so may not exist in good shape anywhere anymore?    

Thanks for the site, apology for the length, will post progress and pics as it proceeds.  Open ears for everything, please and thanks.  Sorry no pics yet, I know those are favorited.  Next time.       

-Clint