1955 CommuterRestore

Hi the boat looks awesome, I do not know anything about wooden boats, what do you mean when you (bedded the planks in 5200). Do you coat the underside 100% with 5200 or just around the edges.   How about pictures for an example. Thanks Keep up the great work. It really does look great.

Just beautiful how she's coming together!

fgroce wrote: Hi the boat looks awesome, I do not know anything about wooden boats, what do you mean when you (bedded the planks in 5200). Do you coat the underside 100% with 5200 or just around the edges.   How about pictures for an example. Thanks Keep up the great work. It really does look great.

Thanks and yes the entire board is bedded in 5200 like you would do with floor tile. it is spread it on with a notched trowel

Morfoot wrote: Beautiful work as always and I'll definitely use the foam roller trick on the set of Cypress Gardens Mustang Ski's I'm restoring. Can't wait to see it again in person.

Tim, unless you're using varnish I might be inclined to buy a spray can of Minwax polyurethane and spray it on. If you do apply by hand the method is to roll it on and then brush it smooth with a dry foam brush from Harbor freight. That gets the roller lines and air bubbles out. Toss the roller and the brush in the trash when done.

skutsch wrote: Ok, so the top 3/4 of that boat is going to be beautiful, going to be - hell it already is!. Now, I remember you mentioned the bottom had a West Marine Fiberglass job done to it, specifically you remarked it was actually in good shape. So what will happen to the bottom - will the boat be flipped, so the bottom can be sanded, painted to give it a finish to match the rest of the beautiful boat?

No flip, good old lay on your back sand and paint.    Going to use a 2 part polyurethane so all the old paint has to come off since we don't know what it is. We did some test sanding and it's going to come off fairly easy. Flipping would be better but at this point we just don't want to.

8122pbrainard wrote: 81nautique wrote: No flip, good old lay on your back sand and paint.    . My arms hurt just from the thought!!

Arms, shoulders, neck, back... Yeah, that ain't going to be any fun...

yep I know. I repainted the Hurricane bottom last summer and it is not fun. The red paint on there now though doesn't seem to be to tough.

As for color I only know for certain it will not be red. Same with the interior.

quinner wrote: Wouldn't it be easier to set the hull on sandpaper and slide the boat back and forth?

Hahahahaha. I actually snorted beer through my nose.

yesterday was a test fit of the seating to see if there's any mods needed before it goes out for upholstery. Not sure what was going on with the rear seat but it get dropped back down to it's original height. Guessing someone was trying to make a storage area but to be kind I'd just say that looks a little uncomfortable.

This is kind of funny/sad/true so I'm adding it to the back seat height conversation. Quinner and I are trying to get in better shape and we were out kayaking yesterday. I mentioned that the pounds I've put on the last ten years have to come off because when I'm traveling in Asia, they do not have toilets of the kind us Yankees (and Rebels) are accustomed to. Without too much detail, let's just say that getting back up after doing one's business is a lot more like a deep water slalom start than it should be. Getting old has some consequences that need attention.

8122pbrainard wrote: [QUOTE=john b] Maybe just old people Alan. Some of the geezers I have had in the Supra have trouble on a 5" seat and I suspect they will in the Mustang too.

John,
I hope you're not putting me in the " old geezer" category! I didn't even put these extra talls in the new house!

Not a chance, Pete. You have a love for boats. Some of the casuals take one look at the Alumitoon and the Supra and there is no further discussion. They need their patio.

Wow looks great.

Time flies! Time for a Commuter update and what a cool update this will be. Exciting news on the power plant.

Todd located a Chrysler Hemi up in Canada last December so he made a deal and hit the road.   We weren't exactly sure what it was because the original engine badge was missing . It had dual quads so it was either a 331 at 250 hp or a 354 at 275 hp. How could you go wrong with that right?

Anyway the motor made it home and I headed down to the farm the next Saturday to see if we could get it running. It came out of a big Greavette that was being repowered and it supposedly ran. We spent a few hours checking it out, getting fuel and power hooked up. It spun over easy by hand so we oiled it up and turned the key.   Took a few cranks but eventually fired up and sounded pretty darn good. Oddly enough it developed a miss after a few minutes so we shut it down and decided to do a compression test. Found one dead cylinder and one with about 50 psi so the heads had to come off.

this is what we found. The old sodium filled exhaust valves were pretty beat so the heads got sent out and refurbished from top to bottom. New guides and oversize valves.


We decided to load the motor up and bring it to my shop so we could work inside in the heat. Once we got the heads back we did some cleaning up of parts and sprayed it.













Loading her back up for the drive south to the farm, gift wrapped for Renee!


We did verify from casting numbers and measuring the bore that it is a 331 at .030 over so it's a 250 Hp version. very cool motor to say the least.

Nice work gang

Nice progress