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Some boats are just lucky.
The 1958 Skagit 20-foot express cruiser we've just finished restoring for Charlie and Pat Johns of West Richland, Washington, might have been cut up and hauled to the dump several years ago...but it's been given a reprieve and now has the proverbial Good Home. (Early this coming week we'll tow the boat over to Associated Glass in Lynnwood for installation of cabin and windshield glass; after that it'll be towed home by Charlie and Pat...where it'll be the most babied fishing boat you've ever seen.)
Lee and Suzanne Turner, who back in 2003 lived in Mount Vernon, rescued the Skagit the first time, saving it from oblivion in west-central Oregon. The poor thing had started life as an outboard, then was crudely converted into an inboard-outboard rig (OMC 120, which was a dismembered pile of rust by the time we saw it). The Skagit had been named Ho-Hum, probably by the guy who hacked up the transom to install the i/o, and it looked the part. The Turners were lucky to get home, since the boat's original trailer fell apart in Portland...but they were fortunate to be near an exit that led straight to a used-boat enterprise, where they bought another rusty old trailer and continued plodding toward Mount Vernon.
After getting home, they parked the boat alongside their house, hoping to plan their restoration strategy during the off-season, but during a winter storm the original fiberglass windshield frame was crushed by a falling tree, breaking both pieces of original windshield glass.
The next Spring, perhaps somewhat discouraged, Lee and Suzanne happened across a ready-to-use 1959 Skagit 20 express that needed refinishing but was otherwise functional. It came with a non-original hardtop someone had fashioned that was flat as a billiard table, weighed about the same and was butt-ugly, so they hauled the boat over to our place and it became the first restoration performed after we moved the shop from Whidbey to Marrowstone Island in 2004. We removed the awful hardtop, chipped and sanded non-skid paint off of the entire cabin and deck (somebody had gone berserk with the stuff, applying it everywhere...apparently using a broom for a brush), and we repainted the boat in its original red and white.
So, the poor old '58 Skagit became surplus property once again, and being a rotten-boat addict, I adopted the old girl and jammed her in the park-n-hide lot along with many other would-be princesses. It sat there for a long time before Charlie and Pat Johns came looking for a 20-foot Skagit. They ended up with the '58 model, and it continued on the sidelines until this year, when we finally had an opportunity to restore the boat.
The first task was to fill the transom's gaping outdrive hole, and figure out what to do about the long-missing splashwell structure, which appeared to have been chainsawed into oblivion by the owner who crudely installed the i/o package. (Normally, Skagit 20s have a narrow fiberglass bridgedeck that arches across the rear end of the cockpit, forming the upper lip of a splashwell bulkhead, with a plywood splashwell box between the bulkhead and transom. This boat had nothing, since the OMC engine had taken up what originally was the splashwell area.)
Below are a variety of shots of Charlie and Pat's project, starting with the filling-in of the outdrive cavity and proceeding to yesterday's visit by Charlie and Pat...the final step before it goes to the glass company.
As we got started on the restoration, the most difficult decision seemed to be color. Charlie and Pat both wanted some kind of turquoise or green color for the deck and cabin, but exactly which shade became a source of some uncertainty. Charlie finally e-mailed photos of a beautifully-restored 1956 Chev with its original Pinecrest Green color, and we knew we had a winner. I went to one of our favorite websites, Auto Color Library, where you can find and match virtually any car color ever made, and had them mix up a gallon of acrylic enamel in Pinecrest Green. If you're curious, go to www.tcpglobal.com/autocolorlibrary and enter the manufacturer and year of any vehicle; you'll be shown the original color-chip card and given a way to order that color in any number of different products. We sprayed the green color, after adding reducer and hardener.
For the hullsides, we chose Interlux Perfection two-part paint, Oyster White, which we rolled and tipped after first spraying the green. The boat's interior is all done in Interlux Brightside Polyurethane, Hatteras Off-White, brushed.
Like many old project boats, the Skagit required replacement of all wood, starting with the transom and including the cockpit floor, cabin bulkhead and cabin interior. We had to build an entirely new splashwell since the old structure had been destroyed. Charlie and Pat wanted a fairly straightforward interior--one big platform berth with four storage cubbies below; a little shelf up in the bow; two new dome lights above sitting positions just inside the cabin, and a mahogany cabin bulkhead. We used 1088 Grade marine-mahogany plywood throughout, and dressed the cockpit side panels with some ribbon-grained 6mm mahogany ply. The helm has Teleflex No-Feedback steering with a 1950's-vintage Vollrath steering wheel, lathe-turned mahogany center hub, and twin fuel tanks hidden under the matching seat-support boxes. Charlie and Pat wanted the aft end of the cockpit as open as possible, so we fashioned two folding, radiused rear-corner seats that mainly function as steps when boarding from a dock.
After Associated Glass finishes installing the cabin windows and upper windshield glass, the boat will be taken to an upholstery shop in central Washington, where Charlie and Pat will have a soft top fashioned, along with interior cushions. Then it'll go to a Mercury outboard dealership for installation of a new 115-hp (or maybe 125-hp) four-stroke outboard.
We loved working with Charlie and Pat, both retired Navy and the nicest people you could ever meet, and we hope to see them at some NWCBC events in the future...starting next summer.
Enjoy your new boat, my friends!
- Marty
The 1958 Skagit 20-foot express cruiser we've just finished restoring for Charlie and Pat Johns of West Richland, Washington, might have been cut up and hauled to the dump several years ago...but it's been given a reprieve and now has the proverbial Good Home. (Early this coming week we'll tow the boat over to Associated Glass in Lynnwood for installation of cabin and windshield glass; after that it'll be towed home by Charlie and Pat...where it'll be the most babied fishing boat you've ever seen.)
Lee and Suzanne Turner, who back in 2003 lived in Mount Vernon, rescued the Skagit the first time, saving it from oblivion in west-central Oregon. The poor thing had started life as an outboard, then was crudely converted into an inboard-outboard rig (OMC 120, which was a dismembered pile of rust by the time we saw it). The Skagit had been named Ho-Hum, probably by the guy who hacked up the transom to install the i/o, and it looked the part. The Turners were lucky to get home, since the boat's original trailer fell apart in Portland...but they were fortunate to be near an exit that led straight to a used-boat enterprise, where they bought another rusty old trailer and continued plodding toward Mount Vernon.
After getting home, they parked the boat alongside their house, hoping to plan their restoration strategy during the off-season, but during a winter storm the original fiberglass windshield frame was crushed by a falling tree, breaking both pieces of original windshield glass.
The next Spring, perhaps somewhat discouraged, Lee and Suzanne happened across a ready-to-use 1959 Skagit 20 express that needed refinishing but was otherwise functional. It came with a non-original hardtop someone had fashioned that was flat as a billiard table, weighed about the same and was butt-ugly, so they hauled the boat over to our place and it became the first restoration performed after we moved the shop from Whidbey to Marrowstone Island in 2004. We removed the awful hardtop, chipped and sanded non-skid paint off of the entire cabin and deck (somebody had gone berserk with the stuff, applying it everywhere...apparently using a broom for a brush), and we repainted the boat in its original red and white.
So, the poor old '58 Skagit became surplus property once again, and being a rotten-boat addict, I adopted the old girl and jammed her in the park-n-hide lot along with many other would-be princesses. It sat there for a long time before Charlie and Pat Johns came looking for a 20-foot Skagit. They ended up with the '58 model, and it continued on the sidelines until this year, when we finally had an opportunity to restore the boat.
The first task was to fill the transom's gaping outdrive hole, and figure out what to do about the long-missing splashwell structure, which appeared to have been chainsawed into oblivion by the owner who crudely installed the i/o package. (Normally, Skagit 20s have a narrow fiberglass bridgedeck that arches across the rear end of the cockpit, forming the upper lip of a splashwell bulkhead, with a plywood splashwell box between the bulkhead and transom. This boat had nothing, since the OMC engine had taken up what originally was the splashwell area.)
Below are a variety of shots of Charlie and Pat's project, starting with the filling-in of the outdrive cavity and proceeding to yesterday's visit by Charlie and Pat...the final step before it goes to the glass company.
As we got started on the restoration, the most difficult decision seemed to be color. Charlie and Pat both wanted some kind of turquoise or green color for the deck and cabin, but exactly which shade became a source of some uncertainty. Charlie finally e-mailed photos of a beautifully-restored 1956 Chev with its original Pinecrest Green color, and we knew we had a winner. I went to one of our favorite websites, Auto Color Library, where you can find and match virtually any car color ever made, and had them mix up a gallon of acrylic enamel in Pinecrest Green. If you're curious, go to www.tcpglobal.com/autocolorlibrary and enter the manufacturer and year of any vehicle; you'll be shown the original color-chip card and given a way to order that color in any number of different products. We sprayed the green color, after adding reducer and hardener.
For the hullsides, we chose Interlux Perfection two-part paint, Oyster White, which we rolled and tipped after first spraying the green. The boat's interior is all done in Interlux Brightside Polyurethane, Hatteras Off-White, brushed.
Like many old project boats, the Skagit required replacement of all wood, starting with the transom and including the cockpit floor, cabin bulkhead and cabin interior. We had to build an entirely new splashwell since the old structure had been destroyed. Charlie and Pat wanted a fairly straightforward interior--one big platform berth with four storage cubbies below; a little shelf up in the bow; two new dome lights above sitting positions just inside the cabin, and a mahogany cabin bulkhead. We used 1088 Grade marine-mahogany plywood throughout, and dressed the cockpit side panels with some ribbon-grained 6mm mahogany ply. The helm has Teleflex No-Feedback steering with a 1950's-vintage Vollrath steering wheel, lathe-turned mahogany center hub, and twin fuel tanks hidden under the matching seat-support boxes. Charlie and Pat wanted the aft end of the cockpit as open as possible, so we fashioned two folding, radiused rear-corner seats that mainly function as steps when boarding from a dock.
After Associated Glass finishes installing the cabin windows and upper windshield glass, the boat will be taken to an upholstery shop in central Washington, where Charlie and Pat will have a soft top fashioned, along with interior cushions. Then it'll go to a Mercury outboard dealership for installation of a new 115-hp (or maybe 125-hp) four-stroke outboard.
We loved working with Charlie and Pat, both retired Navy and the nicest people you could ever meet, and we hope to see them at some NWCBC events in the future...starting next summer.
Enjoy your new boat, my friends!
- Marty
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