Talk me out of buying this sweet boat

[Lewis863]

Gas tanks can be a real gut punch on any boat and they are damn impossible to inspect ...

[Xxx]

23 minutes ago, Lewis863 said:

Oh They are out there just gotta poke and look carefully cause there are also nightmares among them ... I just restored a pursuit Denali for a friend... the boat sucked up 15 k real fast plus several hundred hours of my labor ...corroded gas tanks, corroded cracked cooling manifolds were the big ticket items but the labor hours all the pumps and rewiring all switches and it took two years to work through it all straight because of neglect and ignorance...if he had to pay me for my labor he would have been better off sinking it in the ocean and walking away

 

   That’s my salt story, and I did all the work myself also!! Otherwise I would of taken the works to the landfill!! 

[Lewis863]

Well pap we have something in common ... except I just ended the deal because my partner was too annoying and I really wanted my own ride 

[jth21usa]

The nice thing about salt water is they very really have the rot problems Great Lakes boats have.

[Xxx]

51 minutes ago, jth21usa said:

The nice thing about salt water is they very really have the rot problems Great Lakes boats have.

 

                     That to me is the only plus!!! After I rebuilt the entire engine, thinking everything was a go the first 30 seconds of it running I knew there was something wrong. Severely Pizzed off I had to walk away pulled the plugs and I had water in every cylinder. WTF over, how can all the cylinders have water, Hmmm, well the intake puts fuel to every cylinder, why not, made plated over the runners on both sides with the gaskets, and a plate over the carb base with a air valve in it. Let it set overnight and the next day I only had like 3 pounds of air in it and it blew a hole in the bottom of the intake. So the intake where the water runs and the thermostat is that runner rusted through and it was putting fuel and water to every cylinder!! So what I thought was good the damn salt ate through that also. Put a different 2 barrel intake on, everything has been working just fine. Knock on wood!! But my stringers and floor are in great shape, they look that petrified wood, hard as hell. That’s my war story on sea water boats that has some good steady salt water time on it. I would consider a low Hr’s on it salt water boat with a outboard for a power source. Nothing with more the 50-60 hrs on it though!!??

[Bozeman Bob]

Not to hijack thread but,^ unless you buy a closed cooling system inboard from saltwater you should look in the mirror. OR you  buy it cheap enough that the money you saved over a fresh water boat or raw water cooling more than off sets the cost of repower. I believe the OP wrote in another thread that he was planning on repowering in the near future if need be. Do your homework on what engines go for before buying a boat with a ton of hours, raw water cooled from saltwater or has low compression etc. I will put money on the OPs engines being trouble free due to salt water.

Edited April 18, 2018 by Bozeman Bob