14' Feather Craft V-hull

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FishFry

FishFry

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This followed me home:

start.jpg


I'm still working on the layout for the boat. While I think about that, I'm working on the trailer. It looks to be from roughly the same time as the boat, late 50's. No lights, and the hubs had some badly installed zerks that would let in more water than grease. The frame is good, and that's about all that will stay. I've been collecting the parts I need to fix the trailer, and might have it all together this weekend.

trailer.jpg
 
Somebody started to replace the transom on this boat a long time ago. Or I should say they took it all apart and I got the boat without any transom in it at all. This transom is made up of two pieces of wood, one outside and one inside the boat. Right now my guess is the wood on the outside was 3/4" plywood. I'm not so sure about the inside, any thoughts on how thick that should be? Is there a standard transom width for small boats?

From inside:

transom-front-side.jpg


and outside:

transom-back.jpg
 
I'm curious as to why you say there should be a piece of wood on the aft of the transom. The aft side of your transom area looks almost identical to my MirroCraft, which only had a 1-1/2" thickness of wood on the inside:

normal_PIC-0030.jpg


normal_PIC-0032.jpg


normal_PIC-0044.jpg


I'm not saying you're incorrect, I'm just trying to understand.

On second look, is the "silver" area on the aft side an aluminum plate like on my MirroCraft? Or is it an unpainted area where wood once was?

Mark
 
As far as the wood being on the outside of the transom, I've found pictures of feather craft's online and lots of them are like this. I've been wondering if bolting an aluminum plate on the outside would be a better solution though. I didn't get this to restore.

The bar on the side of the trailer frame is some sort of primitive tilt trailer. You pull two pins and swing the lever out, this drops the weight of the stern of the boat on the rear roller by lowering the rear of the two bunks. Pretty complicated approach, and I'm not sure how usefull it will actually be. Here's a picture I have of the lever:

tilt.jpg
 
Looks like a purdy good start.Wish I could help with the transom,but I haven't even seen a boat like yours or trailer.You planning to buy/restore an engine from the same time period?That would make one nice old timer.
 
I've got a plan for the transom now, and some plywood and aluminum ready to go. I've been fixing the trailer first, I'll have some pictures of it soon. While working on the trailer I found a date welded into the frame, 1957. I think the boat and trailer were sold together. There's no id number or date on the hull that I've found, at least not yet.

A motor from the 50's would look good on it but I'm not holding my breath expecting to find a reliable motor that old. I don't own a motor right now, so I am looking while the rest of the project comes along.

I've dumped a quart of paint stripper on the bow so far, horrible stuff to work with. I'll need the big container to finish the job with. But under the paint the aluminum hull is anodized blue, if I can clean the paint off I might leave it like that.
 
Here's what the trailer looks like now:

traileryellow.jpg


And here's what the boat looks like under the paint:

bow.jpg


The trailer may get some tie downs added, I'm going to launch the boat a few times first and see how it all works, and what really needs more attention. Maybe goalposts too. It needs a new axle right away, new hubs just didn't seat properly on this old axle. A little too unique. It will look the same with the new axle though, and that's a quick thing to change. I'm happy to move on to working on the boat at this point.

Also - the tilt mechanism works much better than I thought it would.
 
Good idea working on that trailer - your boat probably spends more time on it than it does in the water.... you take care of it, and it will take care of your boat
 
FishFry said:
Here's what the trailer looks like now:

traileryellow.jpg


And here's what the boat looks like under the paint:

bow.jpg


The trailer may get some tie downs added, I'm going to launch the boat a few times first and see how it all works, and what really needs more attention. Maybe goalposts too. It needs a new axle right away, new hubs just didn't seat properly on this old axle. A little too unique. It will look the same with the new axle though, and that's a quick thing to change. I'm happy to move on to working on the boat at this point.

Also - the tilt mechanism works much better than I thought it would.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks guys. I painted it myself, nothing fancy just wirewheel then rustoleum. And the tow vehicle is not yellow, the kids got to pick the trailer color is what happened. I'm pretty happy I didn't have to paint it pink or purple.
 
FishFry said:
Somebody started to replace the transom on this boat a long time ago. Or I should say they took it all apart and I got the boat without any transom in it at all. This transom is made up of two pieces of wood, one outside and one inside the boat. Right now my guess is the wood on the outside was 3/4" plywood. I'm not so sure about the inside, any thoughts on how thick that should be? Is there a standard transom width for small boats?

I own a 1957 Richline 14-foot aluminum V-bottom boat that was made with 3/4-inch plywood on both the inside and outside of the transom. The metal transon consists of only one sheet of .o63 aluminum sandwiched betweeen the two sheets of 3/4-inch plywood.

As you can see in this photo there is a aluminum U-shaped cap over the top of both sheets of plywood.

Richline%20transom%20before%20changes1.JPG


Your trailer looks great!

Old Bill
Click to expand...
 
Reason I ask about that lever is we once had the same sort of thing under a 50s Larson trailer. Except, it raised and lowered the middle roller, not the bunks. Thought maybe you might have a little more info.
 

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