I want it, I can have it, but I won’t take it.

What was the tittle of the movie? 

67LS1 said:

A 50' wooden boat in a barn? The cost of moving it will be more than it's worth. And the cost of restoration will be far more then it will ever be worth. WAY more.

The marina where we keep our boat recently instituted a no wooden boat rule. Two boat owners were asked to remove there wooden boats from the marina and no new wooden boats will be allowed. The marina states it's insurance and liability driven. I have no idea where these two owners will find berths

You don't do Wood boats for profit. You do them for the romance, the ride, the smells, sounds, and beauty. 
 Just like your wife. 

wearymicrobe said:

frenchyd said:

I have always had a sweet spot in my heart for Wood Chris Craft Cruisers.  There is a 1952 DCFB 50' Cruiser sitting in a barn in Wisconsin  the owner is willing to give me free if I come and get it.  
     This is classic elegance that last I saw it only needed a good cleaning and revarnishing.  

So yeah I missed the whole 50 foot thing. Keep walking away and don;t look back. I keep looking at the little 19 foot runabouts from the 50's 

 

The 50' is my sweet spot because my uncle had a 50' Hutchins with the three Allison V12's like the PT boats of WW2. It must have been built post war.   That required 115/145 Av gas. 
 On the rare occasions when he'd fire both engines and go full throttle you could see the fuel gauge drop.  But wow was that sound ever glorious.  It had 6, 6" brass exhaust pipes. 

In reply to frenchyd :

Absence of Malice

In reply to Datsun310Guy :

Oh, I remember it well.  Filmed in Florida. 
Thank you. 

ultraclyde said:

I love the look of wooden boats. In my recent boat searching I rn across a couple of Lymans in good operational shape in the 20' range. I drooled over the photos until I thought about the maintenance. It was like that point in a horror movie when you see the monster the first time. 

The thought of dealing with a 50' wooden boat almost gave me a panic attack.

I was reading some actual history of the Caribbean pirates recently. No one ever talks about how often they beached, burned, or abandoned  ships because of rot, worms, and decay. I'm convinced without major OCD level care wood boats have a lifespan slightly better than tissue paper. 

 

What's the book?

I need to find some pictures of my grandfather's boat. He had a couple of boats while my mother was growing up.  The last one he and she piloted down the ICW from CT to (I think) Savannah, GA after which he had it trucked up to Lake Lanier near Atlanta where I remember being on it a few times back in the 70's.  He sold it sometime during the early 80's since most of the family had moved out of state and he wasn't using it much.  I'm almost certain it was a wooden boat with twin inboard V8 engines. Chryslers, I seem to remember. To this day, whenever I smell a V8 engine running really rich, it reminds me of that boat.  And the burble of an un-muffled exhaust just into the waterline. 

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

Those are great memories.  It's doubtful your children will ever have the privilege of ridding in a wooden boat with those twin exhaust pipes burbling like that.  
     Now days only the wealthy can afford things like that.  We used to spend our winters cleaning and revarnishing the boat to get ready for the boating season. I was prized because as a skinny little kid I could craw into places adults couldn't get to and put a fresh coat of red lead into the engine compartment.  What's more I took great pride in being selected and painted carefully to avoid runs.