Interior Refurbishing

Offshore Outboard

Today I went to Bruce B's house to pick up his old outboard. By old I mean 54 years.

He and I formed a gentleman's agreement back in October that he would hold the motor until my transom was completed. Well it is (I'll update that soon) so we successfully mounted it this afternoon.

To back up a bit, my first vision for power was to get a couple of matched 1950's-era 40 hp motors for propulsion. This was quite common in the 50's because the biggest outboard you could buy was about 60 hp; not really enough for water skiing behind a 20' boat or going much faster than 20 mph. I soon found that finding good twin engines would be very difficult, and likely involve too much time and money. So I searched eBay for engines built into the mid-60's, but found mostly junk or fully restored examples for big bucks. Enter Bruce.

His father, who picked up their 1958 Skagit Express at the factory and trailered it home to Spokane, bought a 60 hp engine but traded it in for a 1964 Johnson Golden Meteor 90 hp 6 years later. Think about that name. It's not just a Meteor; that would be good enough for one of the most powerful outboard offered in 1964...it's a Golden Meteor. I'm an astronomy/space buff, and don't think it could get any better than that.

Another thing before introducing the Meteor. I've mentioned before that I'm a long-time sailor. Sailboats need a centerboard or keel to sail into the wind so they aren't blown sideways. Our current boat has a draft of nearly 7 ft. In my thinking, part of the appeal and utility of a smaller outboard boat is the ability to run it up on the beach and explore the land by foot, without needing to carry a dinghy. To do this (obviously) you need to tilt the engine up. Outboards didn't have built-in tilt and trim controls until much later than 1964 (it was an option, but finding one would probably be next to impossible), and large outboards like the Meteor are almost impossible to lift out of the water when on board. So, I found a company called CMC that makes a tilt plate to do exactly that for older motors. It is electric-hydraulic, and beefy enough to carry motors up to 130 hp. Got it new-in-box on eBay for much less than the $850 most vendors sell it for.

Enough of the backstory. Here are some pictures and graphics of the Meteor:

Mighty Meteor Mounted!

Emphasizing the electric shift feature of the motor. Hope it is really carefree 54 years later!

Electric is good. All those attractive people make it much more enticing!

Loads of fun with a Golden Meteor!

V-4 configuration, which makes it short but kind of fat. Note how clean the engine is. 525 documented hours over its 54 years, with regular maintenance records.

Original controls came with the engine; very rare to have little fading of the paint or decals. Bruce's boat has been under cover for its entire life.

Under power on Bruce's boat. Hope to take a similar picture on my boat soon!

Golden Meteor mounted on the CMC tilt plate on Scott's Skagit today. This accessory can tilt the motor up to 90 degrees and also trim it to achieve the highest efficiency at any speed. 

The happy installers.

Today was also the first real road trip for the boat and newly refurbished trailer under my tenure. Everything went OK, but there were some lessons learned that I will document in the trailer section in the future, and of course alert you on the introductory page of this blog.

7/25/2018
Yesterday Bruce came up to help start up the Meteor and offer tips on tuning, etc. He brought his huge watering trough so we could not only start and idle the motor but also test gear engagement.

I had spent parts of the two previous days installing instruments in the helm box and wiring up the controls. I must admit it was hard to begin drilling holes in the helm box I has spent so much time patching up and reinforcing! The wiring was tedious, but I've done this kind of thing before and Bruce did a good job labeling the leads when he uninstalled it from his boat, so everything worked as planned.

Helm box with instruments installed. Clockwise from upper left: tachometer, compass, speedometer, ammeter, engine hour meter, switches for horn, navigation lights, cabin lights, etc. The switch with the round bezel is tilt/trim for the CMC unit. Steering wheel restoration in progress.

I was very happy to see that the tachometer worked when we fired up the engine. I bought it on eBay with very little documentation; there are a dizzying number of tachometer protocols, but guess I got lucky.

I was also pleased that the engine fired up almost immediately and ran flawlessly once we adjusted the throttle. The electric shift mechanism also worked, so the boat is nearly ready for sea trials. This will probably be after the La Conner Car & Boat Show on August 4th, 2018. It will be displayed on the trailer as a work in progress. I plan on painting the hull in the fall or next spring, and haven't done anything to the interior. Come check it out, along with several other classic Skagit Plastic boats.

Here is a short video of the motor test. The first 2/3s is idling, then shifting it into forward.

https://youtu.be/Zq01e5dnCjc