Dave's 1969 Ouachita bass boat restoration/refurbishment

[Dave_1972]

Thought I would start a thread here on my ongoing efforts to restore my family heirloom 1969 Ouachita bass boat. My dad bought it in 1972 and we fished it up until 2008. It has sat untouched in his barn since then as he passed in 2012. I have twin boys of my own who are 11 now - so I'm working through getting the boat back on the water.

The boat is in decent shape for having sat so long - but the trailer was looking pretty rough. So last winter i put the boat on my auto lift and went through the trailer completely. At this point - I have finished the refurbishment of the trailer and started working on cleaning up the outside of the boat. I bought the Meguiar's kit for dealing with fiberglass oxidation, removed all the stickers on the boat, worked over the outside of the boat with step one - and now have applied new stickers.

I am now looking at going through the motor and finding out what surprises await me there. Now for a few pics on what has transpired so far.

Here is the boat right after I drug it home from my Dad's old shop:

 

[Dave_1972]

Auto Lifts make great boat lifts...

 

[Dave_1972]

While working on the trailer I found a pretty nasty old weld repair my uncle did - I decided to save the original work and just fix the bottom which they left open.
before:

after:

 

[Dave_1972]

My Dad made these rear light mounts for the boat back in 1972 - they had been damaged a few times so I decided to make my own (I hung the originals up on the wall of my shop).

 

[Dave_1972]

A good view of the new rear light assemblies after the trailer was finished. I had it powder coated - new wheels and tires. Rebuilt the hubs and springs. And sand blasted and painted everything else myself. I also fixed the tilt trailer (it was welded shut) so that works again now. All new wiring as well, basically a 1969 Moody trailer re-done end-to-end. But not back to 100% original so more refurbished than restored.

Those are re-pop 28 Ford tail lights if anyone wants to know.

 

[Dave_1972]

And here is a picture of where I am at today. I hunted down replacement stickers (including the 1970's leaping bass and Ouachita Indian) and have applied them after working out some of the oxidation in the fiberglass.



Next up:
-Finish up polishing/waxing the outer hull.
-Start investigating the state of the 50hp Evinrude.

 

[sphelps]

Looks nice ! Careful with the stick steer . My ex- son-in -law got thrown out of the exact same boat last year when he took his hand off the stick for 2 seconds while up on plane ... And of coarse he didnt have the kill switch tied to him . Round and round she went till it hit a tree overhanging the bank and sank .. I think you can adjust the tension on the steering cable ..

 

[Dave_1972]

So I spent the week manually turning the motor and fogging the cylinders with Sea Foam - Deep Creep. Today I did my first compression testing. I like the numbers I'm seeing but I'm not an Evinrude expert. I managed to get an original 1973 Service manual for my engine - a 50737R - but I can't find compression number listed in it.

So I thought I would look for some opinions here. I did several tests but here are the results from the last three (where I actually remembered to clear the gauge each time).

Upper cylinder: 166, 164, 165

Lower cylinder: 157, 155, 158

I was a little surprised to see numbers that high, but again I wasn't certain what kind of compression numbers I should be looking for on this motor.

Anyone see a problem here?