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Snake Mountain Boatworks has been entrusted with preserving what will one day again be a truly sexy little runabout, a 1957 Penn Yan Captivator.

We are indebted to her owners, who found her in New Hampshire, for their commitment to this project and for trusting SMB to execute it in an historically-correct manner. By spring she will ride her newly-preserved, chrome yellow Tee Nee trailer, herself having been returned to her original glory, to this couple’s home on the shores of one of the Adirondacks thousands of lakes.

She has been treated terribly by at least one well-meaning but woefully uninformed woodworker. Her original upholstered, almost bucket seating was torn out and replaced by what probably was quite expensive slat-centric seating.

Fortunately for this boat, a friend who owns an original Captivator, and whose Vermont home is nearby, offered his boat to serve as our pattern when we begin fabricating the interior “furniture” anew.

Not satisfied with having destroyed her cockpits, this person then turned his/her attention to her decks, topsides and transom. Staining the beautiful, original mahogany planking black walnut seemed to be perfect. Not!
We began by completely stripping the cockpits down to the ribs, discovering that a half-dozen or so of them are broken, which presents unique challenges in the case of Striptite construction.

Today I am focusing on striping varnish and pulling stain out of the wood. The latter task is made every so much more doable by the Circa 1850 Heavy Body Paint and Varnish Remover I am using. As you can see when I turn my attention to the aft deck, this product allows me to bleed all of the old stain out of the wood, leaving only beautiful mahogany behind.

We will keep you updated as this project moves forward.

Eleonora looked a bit forlorne when he new-owner-to-be and I first climbed onto her, stuffed into a storage shed in Hague, NY. A Lake George (NY) boat, she’d been languishing in that barn for several years when Marselis Parsons and I inspected her, and I quickly concluded that he’d made one of those rare barn finds.
Snake Mountain Boatworks had the honor of bringing her back. There were some rotted planks and many failed fasteners from keel to gunwale, all of which were released and replaced. We removed both bottom and topside paint, faired all surfaces, and repainted her in copper bronze antifouling paint and Interlux two-part Jade Mist Perfection epoxy.
We gutted, cleaned and repainted the bilge, but only after replacing 17 broken, rotted and failed ribs.
Finally, Eleonora is back and swinging from her new mooring in Lake Champlain’s Shelburne Bay.

Enjoy watching her emerge from the SMB shop, be launched and dance across theLake !

UPDATE: Little Chief wins Best of Show in her class at the 2012 Vermont Antique and Classic Boat Show!

Little Chief is now for sale and seeking a new home. Contact us for pricing and terms. Come by the shop to see her up close and personal

She has not seen water for well over ten years. With her ground up preservation complete, we launched her into the waters of Lake Champlain in Vermont on August 4, 2012, and ROAR she did!

This boat now has a new 3M 5200 bottom. Any rib deamed even slightly compromised was replaced. Every framing, planking and deck fastener was released and replaced with silicon bronze. All wood surfaces were treated with Smith’s Clear Penetrating Epoxy Sealer, and all interior surfaces were painted with multiple coats of Sandusky Mahogany Bilge Paint. Every piece of hardware, all of which is original, was transformed in jewelry by D&S Custom Plating in Holyoke, MA. The original 95 HP Chris Craft Model K engine was completely disassembled and then rebuilt by Restoration and Performance Motorcars of Vermont.

Little Chief has now left the preservation shop and is in the Snake Mountain Boatworks sale inventory. We will be happy to explore with you how she can be yours.

Here is Little Chief on her new Sea Lion trailer and ready to leave the shop:

Watch Little Chief slide back into the water for the first time in over a decade:

Watch Little Chief roaring across Lake Champlain with Little Chief:

What a fantastic experience! Having completed her complete preservation that included entirely new transom, engine mounts, interior flooring, seats and instruments; as well as rebuilding her 318 Super Bee II Chrysler V8, and removing and rebuilding gelcoat on the entire length of the hull below the gunwales.

Watch as she emerges from the shop, preservation complete:

Watch her roaring on Lake Dunmore in Salisbury, VT with owner, Angelo Lynn, at the helm:

Words can hardly be found to describe what it feels like doing “only” 40 MPH in a boat having about 14 inches of freeboard! (She has a much higher top end, but the engine needs some run-in hours on it first.)

Yes, Snake Mountain Boatworks mission is saving old wooden boats. However, the transition from wood to fiberglass that pleasure boating experienced beginning in the late 1950s produced a few stunning examples. Among the most stunning was the Cutter Jet de Ville, built in 1959, and sporting big fins borrowed from the auto industry.

These early Cutters were powered by Mercury outboards. The Jet de Ville was no exception, and when found in the woods of northern Vermont, this boat still had her original Mark 55 Thunderbolt Four hanging off her transom.

She was also resting on on a very rusty, flat-tired, but original trailer. A fellow working with a large excavator nearby offered to lift boat and trailer onto my transport trailer. My crew just stared at me as I drove up to the shop, so I had to explain.

Every piece of her original Volwrath stainles steel hardware was intact, as were her original steering wheel and related lines. Yes, the upholstery was completely trashed, but we had enough for patterns.

And, she is left-hand driven, which means she was sold and used in oval circuit racing.

Her preservation complete, she is again sporting her original colors, Merc sunset orange over white. She now rests on the same trailer, which we completely disassembled, sand blasted and repainted. The trailer’s wheels sport proper, NOS 1958 baby moon hubcaps.

Watch as Val Desesare fires up and tunes the Mark 55 that he rebuilt:

She has moved from shop to showroom and joined our inventory of preserved boats for sale.

Come and see her on display August 10, 11, 2012, at the Lake Champlain ACBS Boat Show – at the Boathouse in Burlington, VT.

Watch the crew battle against gravity as we attempt to flip this heavy, very flat rocket.