I used to work, at one of many stages, with an old guy called Tony. By older I mean I was probably only 20 - 21 and he would have been knocking on the door of 65 I suppose...
Now Tony, despite his age was one of the more active and interesting people I had ever had the pleasure of working with. He was still a certified diver, a qualification I had only just achieved, he actively enjoyed water skiing and he was as skilled an engineer as I had ever come across.
There was nothing Tony could not build or design. He had his own workshop and by that I mean he had several milling machines, several lathes(including a vertical lathe) two very large band saws, a reciprocating hacksaw that frightened me and more wielders (gas, MIG, TIG and arc) than you could shake a stick at!
If you couldn't find, buy or steal it - Tony could make it for you!
One Monday morning Tony arrived for work looking rather smug and I couldn't help but notice. So as we sat chatting over a morning cup of coffee, discussing the weekends highlights he looked at me rather beady eyed and said, "I've got myself a new ski boat".
"Ahhhh" says I. "I wondered what the smug look was all about".
"Yes" he says. "350cu small block Chev in a 14 foot fibreglass Haines".
"Dang!" was the best I had to offer.
"Yup" He says. "Only one problem, she's got no gearbox".
I for one didn't really see any problem with this as there would be plenty of old 2 stage powerglides floating around the place that I was sure would mate up nicely to the Chev bell housing, especially when you considered that Tony was on the job...
So nothing happened for quite some time until one day Tony meandered into my workshop at work, deep in thought and obviously carefully mulling something over.
He finally broke free from his reverie and looked up at me with a ponderous look...
"... whataya ya reckon the boat would go like as a direct drive?" he asked.
To be honest I had never (and still haven't) owned a boat, which he knew, so I was surprised that he had even bothered to ask me.
I had however owned several radio controlled model boats with small nitro powered glow engines and they had been direct drive types.
The first thing that came to my mind was the fact that in a full sized version you would have to crank the engine while the boat was in the water and this would mean that the prop would start to make thrust while cranking and the boat would begin moving forward right from that moment. But as Tony rightfully pointed out, you simply wouldn't crank it into life unless there was nobody in front of you. Simple.
O.k second challenge. Being that the prop would be under constant load at all times including idle, she was going to need the mother of all flywheels. Again, this is "TONY" we're talking about here, so no problem really, just mate something off an old truck motor to the output flange on the ole Chev and Bobs your uncle.
O.k third challenge. No reverse. Hmmmm. This one was solved by my youth and enthusiasm.
"Tony" I said, "who the fuck needs reverse when you've got that much horse power for going forward!"
"Just come in toward your trailer slightly up current and drift down current until your in line with the trailer and give it some herb" I reasoned, altogether enthusiastically (I had never owned a boat but I'd been on more than enough to have seen that technique put into play).
Tony, having owned more than his fair share had also successfully employed the same technique.
And so it was that Tony became the proud owner of a not so new boat with a very near to new and reasonably well worked over motor that could pull a small housing estate through a sea of near dry cement!
As a ski boat it was outstanding, especially when you got more than two people behind it - as this took a bit of the, 'snap' out of it.
I liked it, although it was a bit of a handful on take off and getting it back on the trailer under certain conditions was fraught with peril.
More than once we managed to miss time the exact moment or the motor miss fired when aligning with the trailer and this saw the hull punctured as the beast powered up the trailer over the side and crunched into the trailers tail light brackets. But otherwise... that boat was grunty and the traction was nothing short of spine snapping...
But all good things must come to an end and eventually I guess the novelty wore off and Tony decided that the boat was getting a little bit worse for wear and tear. So he put it up for sale.
To be honest I wasn't entirely surprised by the lack of response.. prop driven, direct drive power boats were not exactly the flavor of the month 20 years ago and it's a brave man that takes one on, even today.
Eventually though he got a good strong bite and one Friday afternoon he asked me if I would be able to give him a hand on Saturday morning to put the boat in the water as he had a... 'would be' buyer.
So we arranged to meet up at a little bay with a launching ramp not far from Hillsborough bay on the Manukau harbour in time for the mornings full tide.
When I arrived Tony and the would be buyer were already there.
The 'mark', for want of a better word, was looking over the boat enthusiastically. He was a young Maori guy and from his car I could tell he was a V8 enthusiast. This became more and more obvious as he simply glazed over the minor defects in the boats hull and the obvious signs of vibration wear and became more and more focused on the gleaming Chevy.
So we got the boat in the water and once we were all seated Tony hit the starter.
At this point I must explain the seating arrangement.
Now Tony may have been a great engineer but he was also British and despite having lived in New Zealand for the past 14 years he had lost none of his frugal mentality. So what he had come up with was a bracket that was bolted and molded/glassed into the floor of the boat. To this he had fitted the bench seat from the front of an HQ Holden utility. His reasoning was pretty sound really. There were thousands of these seats around and when one wore out or the springs got rusty and collapsed he would throw it away and bolt in another which he cheaply obtained from the local automotive wreckers. Brilliant in many ways. They were really very comfortable, they were large and three could sit comfortably on it, they were cheap and they were easily obtainable.
However seeing as how the boat was up for sale the particular seat we found ourselves sitting upon that particular morning was really past it's use by date, but why buy a new one when your about to sell it, right...?
Why indeed...?
Anyway... The three of us are perched happily on this bench seat when Tony keys the starter.
The sound of the engine is beautiful. Extractors to a resonator to a four inch tail pipe about two feet long on each side, deafening is one way of putting it but when it's that beautiful purr it's easy to look past the pain and the blood in your ears...
Tony and I both glanced at the 'mark' and we could tell from the dreamy expression on his face that if the motor performed as per it's usual standard and didn't misfire or run rough we had a taker on our hands. We were already making good wake at idle and the young fella was obviously bursting to see what this thing could do.
So with a knowing nod at me and a devilish smirk Tony slammed the throttle wide open.
With a bellow like a wounded bull the prop bit and the engine note went straight to 4000RPM.
The g force was spectacular!
For an instant...
In the next it was gone!
The back of our seat collapsed and folded backwards!
Only Tony who was gripping the steering wheel remained on the wretched seat but he didn't have the strength to maintain his grip on the wheel and take one hand off to back off the throttle. In the blink of an eye, the 'mark' and I were a tangled, battered, cut and bruised mass, forced cruelly back and pinned to the transom by the amazing g forces that only two hundred horsepower of screaming V8 can apply.
The nose of the boat was still pointing at the sky as we had still nowhere near reached planing speed as yet and the prop was still cavitating. But it was catching up fast and the faster we went the more perilous became our predicament, because now as the nose began to level out our speed was starting to allow the boat to skim and our driver was less steering and more simply hanging on for dear life, staring awestruck and terrified at the sky!!!
Without a steady hand on the wheel or if Tony's strength failed we could quite understandably cut viciously to the left or right which would see us quickly and spectacularly removed from our relatively safe position, glued to the transom.
Myself and the 'mark' had been somewhat shredded by the cowl that ran half the length of the boat and covered the drive shaft. So between fighting the g forces still being applied and slipping on the blood soaked floor our efforts to move toward the accursed throttle were rather thwarted and we tore on madly, completely out of control.
I eventually made it forward inch by inch until I came up behind Tony locked my feet in the gap between the uselessly folded down seat back and the seat itself, wrapped my arms around Tony and also grabbed the wheel. This left him free to take one hand off the wheel and slam the throttle closed!
The resultant lack of forward thrust and the grip of the water on the hull threw the bewildered 'mark' from a cowering position aft, ass over kite to the front of the boat where he landed face down over the seat where our feet would normally have been.
He stayed there for quite awhile... we let him.
Tony killed the ignition.
When he finally hauled himself up and sat himself down Tony began apologizing profusely but our man simply raised one hand and shook his head.
The trip back to shore was a quiet and very low RPM one.
Tony and I decided that it would be wiser perhaps to simply bring the boat in close enough to allow our passenger to disembark rather than risk a dodgy trailer mounting and kill our young friend with a second terror stunt.
Him and I jumped out into the waist deep water and waded to shore, he staggered off towards his car (I suspected it was to check his undies) and I backed Tonys car and the trailer down to the water and dipped the trailer in. To Tony's credit he managed to dock the boat on the trailer without a hint of incident but I could tell from the rueful look on his face that he knew this particular sale was lost.
In honesty I was surprised the young fella hadn't got in his car and vanished in a cloud of dust, smoke and small bouncing stones...
In fact as Tony and I stood beside the trailer fastening the last tie downs, he reappeared.
Tony and I again began pouring forth a rapid string of apologies and the young bloke once again raised his hand in a 'stop' gesture.
With a maniacal glint in in his eye, he looked steadily at the both of us and said,
"Fuck yeah man, I'll take it!!!"
Maori's!
Ya just never really know whats gunna happen...
(In memory of Tony Callum. Merchant Navy man and all around bloody good bloke)
Currently listening to:
Annabel Fay - Annabel Fay
New web site is looking good. Thanks for the great effort.
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