SEABUDDY
ON BOATS

Archive for the ‘classic Chris craft boats’ Category

Your author was born in the fall of 1948. In the winter of 1959, Chris Craft came out with a milestone brochure cover. On it, a 19 foot Silver Arrow was the speedboat featured out in front with a background of a 18 ft Continental runabout, 33 ft. Sport Fisherman, and a 55 foot Constellation Motor Yacht framing that Silver Arrow runabout.

Saturday, October 2, 2010 – after lusting for a ride in a Silver Arrow for 51 years, I got that ride in a perfectly restored one during The Philly Chapter of the ACBS Long Level Show.

The boat was a well-built,heavy craft that shouldered tall wakes out of the picture with the deft hand on the throttle and wheel of the boat’s owner, Dick Hickman. The weather was crisp, the boat was the “looker” on Long Level Lake in PA. and a near life-time year thing was well satisfied. Boy, do I love the ACBS and its two chapter’s in the Philly area and on the Chesapeake Bay. BTW, both Dick and I are members of each chapter.

In case you forgot, a Silver Arrow Chris Craft is a planked boat with a fiberglass deck and an inner bottom of sheet plywood. She uses spruce wood in place of mahogany for planking and set the boating world on its side when she was introduced. Unfortunately, her heavy weight (about 600 lbs extra over a 18 all-wood Chris Craft), pricing (about 25% higher than a 19 ft. Capri), and some new technology (deck to hull joint) only 92 were sold over the two years of its production. And not all of those still exist.

Chris Craft boats was a part time “duck hunting” wooden boat maker in 1874.

It became a fulltime boat building operation owned and run by Christopher Columbus Smith and his brother Henry later. The boats were a part of a mix of carving duck decoys and selling their “catch” at times.

1910 saw a two style boat builder, either boat runabouts or boat  race boats.

Now, in 1925, is the first use of the name “Chriscraft”, as a single word, run together. Boat sales were 111 units in 1925 including Chris Craft race boats.

In 1927 Chris Craft Boats first started building boats year around and 447 boats were made in runabouts, racing boats, commuters, and cabin boats called sedans..

Post WWII, Chris Craft used more and more styles of boats including cabin cruisers and cedar wood  joined various types of wood called mahogany. These pieces were made into planks and large panels, both in plywood sheets and also cut into planks arranged as both smooth-sided and clinker-built planked hulls.

In the fifties, by also expanding to other boat building material choices, Chris Craft reached higher sales levels. Steel, Aluminum, and Fiberglass added more choices and unit sales went over 8,000 units. Fiberglass cabin tops and other parts preceded  fiberglass hulls. Chris Craft boats, cruisers, and yachts built a good provn hull and they did not want to lose that in their transition to an all fiberglass boat.

Chris Craft had 10 open, two closed plants and an administration building in their business by 1965.

By the way, the latest good read on Chris Chris, the building of Chris Craft, and inside the factories is The new book by Tony Mollica and Chris Smith, ISBN 978-0-7603-3592-5.

Seabuddy recommends it as a great gift item to any boater.

Chris Smith, of Chris Craft fame, built a 50′ cruiser than won a 150 mile ocean race race from Miami to Key West in 1919. Its two war surplus engines were also preparded by Chris Smith. The yacht was owned and driven by Gar Wood. Gar and Chris were in a partnership titled Wood – Smith at the time.

credit must be given to the book  Building Chris Craft – inside the factories

by Tony Mollica with Chris Smith ISBN 978 0 7603 3592 5

Courtesy of the Classic Race Boat Association, some of the most elegant and powerful boats ever built will perform exhibition flybys in a race-like setting on a 1.5 mile oval course on Lake Agnes. A host of vintage watercraft will also be on display along with the opportunity to meet the drivers and take photographs.

Fantasy of Flight is located at exit 44 off I-4, halfway between Tampa and Orlando,
at 1400 Broadway Blvd. S.E. in Polk City, FL 33868 or Lake Agnes.

They will have more boat events upcoming. I’ll keep you posted.

The simultaneous starting of a couple hundred engines and sounding of boat horns marked the close of the 39^th annual United States Powerboat Show in Annapolis Sunday evening.  A weekend of glorious weather followed the first day of rain, and people came out by the thousands to tour these magnificent boats.  Attendance more than doubled the rain-soaked 2009 show and rivaled the numbers of 2008, making this one of the best attendance years in the event’s history.

“This industry needed a shot in the arm and a signal that the worst of the sales slump is behind us,” said Paul Jacobs, General Manager of United States Yacht Shows, producers of the event.  “Large enthusiastic crowds, along with the many boats being sold over the four-day event could be a sign that the recovery has begun.  We certainly hope that is the case.  It felt like a far more positive mood among sellers and buyers than the past two years.”

Show Manager, Dee Newman, reported that “Boats of all sizes and styles were sold this year, according to our exhibitors.  Everything from runabouts to trawlers, and tugs to express cruisers shared in the success.  Many sea trials are scheduled to take place in the next few days,” she added.  “We are very happy for them.”

After two consecutive weekends of shows, the Annapolis Boat Shows crew began the daunting task of removing a city of tents and a marina of floating docks.  In just three days, 300 docks will be towed away and hauled out of the water for storage.  Sixty temporary pilings will be pulled from the harbor.  Two hundred and fifty tents, six hundred tent floors, and miles of electrical cable will be removed and put in storage for another year, awaiting next year’s extravaganza.  By Wednesday evening there will be no remaining indication that an event even took place here.  Only a fond memory of 90,000 people having toured hundreds of boats and over 1,100 exhibitors will remain; that and an estimated 60 million dollar economic impact to local business, non-profit organizations, and the state and local governments. 

This past weekend, Mecum Auction and F. Todd Warner set antique boat pricing on its ear. Called the Warner Collection, it was amazing in size and gone/ sold at no reserve. No reserve brings up pricing on some items and brings down others if there is only one bidder.

What happened at this Mecum.com Auction? Some skids of antique boat parts went cheap.  A few boats went for what one would expect in this economy. A few boats may/may not have been a steal.

Without knowing condition; is the 1959  Century Coronado with a hardtop OK going for its $39,000 as a fair deal today? Another one, same year, same model, went for $6,000. Same Auction. Same crowd of bidders.

Messing around with boats often includes what to do in bad weather

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Chris Craft wanted the two cockpits forward with the engine and its shafting behind them.

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