Tweet
Hello all!
A LOT of work ahead of me, anyone care to chime in with tips on tackling my endless list?
By way of intro my name is Marc—for years I had been saving up for a big wakeboard boat, then a friend’s dad bought one ...and handed me the keys to his ‘91 Prostar we skied on back in high school. WOW. So I figure I can put what I would have put down on a big boat toward restoring this little thing...and it needs a LOT of work. More duct tape than vinyl, JB Weld patch in the head (that turned into a HOLE in the head hours after a dealer looked at it and told me “ski on it as long as you want—those things HOLD!”) So I spent August doing the heads myself with a couple of mechanic friends. (Two tries on the intake manifold—leaked the first time because you can’t use seals designed for cast iron on an aluminum one, whoops.)
Anyway plan was I have two kids under two, I’ll teach them to ski on this guy until I get a bigger boat like the old 80s Supra I grew up on. (Of course I’ve been priced WAY out of the Supra market haha)
But then I DROVE this thing. Even with the patch on the heads, it damn near hit factory top speed, 43 MPH, nearly pulled my arm off with its powerslot, and the maneuvering—MAN it’s like a little sports car. So now I’m thinking... who wants one of those wakeboard barges?? I don’t even wakeboard!!
Wrapping up. It’s in the shop for fiberglass, vinyl and carpet work right now. Waiting for them to give me the trailer to tackle. Until then I’m just doing little things while my 2-year-old son says every other day: “Wanna go to lake today, dada? Ride on boat faster and faster??”
This forum has been a MASSIVE help so far, so it was about time I officially joined up.
Questions:
I see a few threads here on replacing steering/throttle cables and gauges, but no really in-depth ones. Is that because those are pretty simple jobs you can do by following a generic YouTube video? Thinking I should maybe do this while the floor is out. Anyone have a source for a set of new gauges—or do you just have to measure and replace them one by one?
When out of the water if you turn the prop shaft by hand in reverse it makes a loud wailing noise. That normal?
I love him, but the previous owner maaay have let a bit of rust get to...everything. I don’t think the exhaust manifold plugs had been pulled in years before I did it, out came a flowing handful of rust when I did. Do I need to replace those? They don’t look like originals so they shouldn’t be THAT old! I was gonna put the drains from DIM I saw on this forum, but that much rust will just clog them, no?
Rot in some floorboards around the driver seat and pylon. Stringers are fiberglass right—not a huge concern for anything underneath I hope?
Then a LOT more I’ll maybe ask about later as I work down the list. But I’ve probably already made you guys go, WOAH, EASY ON THE BOOKPOST!
A LOT of work ahead of me, anyone care to chime in with tips on tackling my endless list?
By way of intro my name is Marc—for years I had been saving up for a big wakeboard boat, then a friend’s dad bought one ...and handed me the keys to his ‘91 Prostar we skied on back in high school. WOW. So I figure I can put what I would have put down on a big boat toward restoring this little thing...and it needs a LOT of work. More duct tape than vinyl, JB Weld patch in the head (that turned into a HOLE in the head hours after a dealer looked at it and told me “ski on it as long as you want—those things HOLD!”) So I spent August doing the heads myself with a couple of mechanic friends. (Two tries on the intake manifold—leaked the first time because you can’t use seals designed for cast iron on an aluminum one, whoops.)
Anyway plan was I have two kids under two, I’ll teach them to ski on this guy until I get a bigger boat like the old 80s Supra I grew up on. (Of course I’ve been priced WAY out of the Supra market haha)
But then I DROVE this thing. Even with the patch on the heads, it damn near hit factory top speed, 43 MPH, nearly pulled my arm off with its powerslot, and the maneuvering—MAN it’s like a little sports car. So now I’m thinking... who wants one of those wakeboard barges?? I don’t even wakeboard!!
Wrapping up. It’s in the shop for fiberglass, vinyl and carpet work right now. Waiting for them to give me the trailer to tackle. Until then I’m just doing little things while my 2-year-old son says every other day: “Wanna go to lake today, dada? Ride on boat faster and faster??”
This forum has been a MASSIVE help so far, so it was about time I officially joined up.
Questions:
I see a few threads here on replacing steering/throttle cables and gauges, but no really in-depth ones. Is that because those are pretty simple jobs you can do by following a generic YouTube video? Thinking I should maybe do this while the floor is out. Anyone have a source for a set of new gauges—or do you just have to measure and replace them one by one?
When out of the water if you turn the prop shaft by hand in reverse it makes a loud wailing noise. That normal?
I love him, but the previous owner maaay have let a bit of rust get to...everything. I don’t think the exhaust manifold plugs had been pulled in years before I did it, out came a flowing handful of rust when I did. Do I need to replace those? They don’t look like originals so they shouldn’t be THAT old! I was gonna put the drains from DIM I saw on this forum, but that much rust will just clog them, no?
Rot in some floorboards around the driver seat and pylon. Stringers are fiberglass right—not a huge concern for anything underneath I hope?
Then a LOT more I’ll maybe ask about later as I work down the list. But I’ve probably already made you guys go, WOAH, EASY ON THE BOOKPOST!
Comment