Being that it is his first Skaterfest, Michigan performance boater Joe Eger isn’t too familiar with everyone attending this weekend’s fifth annual event on Michigan’s Lake St. Clair, which brings Skater Powerboats enthusiasts together to celebrate the brand built by Douglas Marine in Douglas, Mich.
Joe Eger is enjoying his refreshed 28-foot Skater Powerboats catamaran at the fifth annual Skaterfest. All photos courtesy Chris Mills
Catamaran, sportboat or high-performance center console—whether your boat is brand new or has hundreds of hours on it, applying a simple, gentle cleaning method is the key to preserving its long-term beauty. That’s the word from Johnny Walker, the chief executive officer of Baja Marine, the Washington, N.C. parent company of the Baja, Donzi and Fountain powerboat brands.
In a recent press release, Walker—a longtime powerboat owner—outlined the basic boat exterior cleaning strategy used at Powerboat Headquarters, Baja’s pre-owned powerboat refurbishing company.
Pete Opperman, an optometrist from Northern Michigan who owns a 1998 37-foot Stiletto from Outerlimits Offshore Powerboats, is proud of the boat he bought four years ago—especially since he’s upgraded to a set of 725-hp, 600-cubic-inch Goodwin Competition engines and IMCO Marine SCX drives.
If Pete Opperman had his way, he'd run his Outerlimits with his family every summer weekend. Photo by Pete Boden/Shoot 2 Thrill Pix
Not long after I purchased my slightly used Outerlimits SL 44 V-bottom, now called Team Provocative, from the Outerlimits factory in Bristol, R.I., I began to notice some problems with the paint on its deck. From what I could see, the paint was failing to adhere in a few areas. The trouble spots were small and easy to repair and limited to deck, but as time went by they got worse—the areas became larger and quite expensive to repair, especially when the repair area was in the middle of a graphic. In reality, the entire paint job on the deck was failing
As many people inside and outside the Outerlimits circle know, I have close ties with the Outerlimits factory. In fact my relationship with Mike Fiore, who founded the company, went further than the typical supplier-customer relationship. We were good friends.
Although the project took longer than expected to complete, Miami’s Frank Areces can’t wait to show off Ruffled Feathers, his restored 2002 32-foot Douglas Marine/Skater Powerboats catamaran, at Missouri’s Lake of the Ozarks this week.
Frank Areces' 32-foot Skater Ruffled Feathers recently was restored by a talented and experienced group. Photos courtesy Frank Areces
No matter how impeccably they’re maintained, performance boat interiors take a beating from spray—especially of the saltwater kind—and other less predictable “elements” such as sunscreen and spilled beverages. A longtime powerboat owner, John Walker, the chief executive officer of Baja Marine and its refit/refurbish shop dubbed Powerboat Headquarters in Washington, N.C., offered useful advice in a recent press release from the company.
“Cleaning the interior is different from the exterior because now you have food involved,” Walker said in the release. “A lot of what gets in there is fat-based, and once food gets ground in, it’s hard to get out. Use a mild solution of water and dish detergent to clean the interior and the upholstery. That will take the grease out.”
In memory of Outerlimits' founder Mike Fiore, Jared Horowytz put together this Ford F-350 tribute truck
With the annual Lake of the Ozarks Shootout concluded just two days ago, more than a few people have Outerlimits Offshore Powerboats founder Mike Fiore, who died three days after sustaining severe injuries during the 2014 Central Missouri event, on their minds. A longtime admirer of Fiore’s whose family owned Outerlimits sportboats (read the story), 24-year-old Jared Horowytz of Bergen County, N.J., dedicated himself to building a truck in tribute to his fallen hero. That Ford F-350 truck was on scene during Poker Runs America’s Memorial Poker Run in New Jersey last month, one of two fundraising events (the second was hosted by the Performance Boat Club of Canada) for Fiore’s children held on the same day.
Inspired by Tiffany Wild, his better half who was motivated by the OU Want Some Nor-Tech Hi-Performance Boats catamaran she had seen on Missouri’s Lake of the Ozarks several years ago, Randy Wild picked up a 2010 48-foot MTI catamaran a few weeks ago and went ahead with his wife’s dream—a University of Nebraska-themed boat.
Randy and Tiffany Wild found the perfect boat to apply a University of Nebraska theme—this red and white 48-foot MTI catamaran.
Although there’s still some dialing in yet to be done, Grant’s Signature Racing has completed an intriguing project—and an industry first. The famed Bradenton, Fla., rigging shop replaced the triple Mercury Marine 300X two-stroke outboard engines on a 2009 Skater Powerboats 328 flat-deck catamaran with a pair of Mercury Racing 400R Verado outboard engines. It is the first Skater cat to hit the water with the white-hot 400R outboards.
According to company principal Grant Bruggemann, who handled the work with his crew, the 6,500-pound cat currently tops out at 103 mph—the same top speed it achieved with its triple 300-hp engines during testing in Florida before the project began—and there’s more left.
The first Verado 400R outboard engine-powered Skater catamaran to hit the water since engines were introduced, this 32-footer previously was powered by triple 300XS outboards (click to enlarge). Photo courtesy/copyright Grant’s Signature Rigging.
With a season of top-speed shootouts in his 32-foot Gone Again Skater Powerboats catamaran behind him, Texan Kenny Mungle’s focus has shifted to his 2016 shootout ride, a pre-owned Skater 368 cat he purchased in June. Powered by a pair of supercharged 1,550-hp Sterling Performance engines with Arneson ASD-8 surface drives, the 36-footer is getting set up at TNT Custom Marine in Miami.
After several test sessions, John Tomlinson, who co-owns TNT with Mike Thomas, recommended removing the rocker panels (essentially trim tabs) that were mounted in recesses in the rear running surfaces of the rudder-steered catamaran’s sponsons. Tomlinson and Mungle also consulted with Peter Hledin of Skater Powerboats in Douglas, Mich., on the project. The recesses—one in each sponsor—will be “glassed in,” according to Tomlinson, by Guardado Marine in Opa-locka, Fla., to create continuous running surfaces. Then the catamaran will be returned to TNT for more testing.
When Mungle’s Skater 368 returns from Guardado Marine, its rocker plates will be gone and the recesses in the sponsons will be filled (click image to enlarge). Photo courtesy/copyright TNT Custom Marine
Thanks to propeller modifications from BBLADES, a 46-foot Black Thunder has been tamed.
You don’t generally think of Black Thunder V-bottoms as “fast.” There are exceptions, of course—the 43-footer that Dennis Parvey and his son, Jason, piloted to 145 mph late last month at the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout in Central Missouri being chief among them. Still, in the current world of low-profile, cut-down deck V-bottoms with sit-down cockpits, a Black Thunder stands out not as sore thumb but frankly as a small building. And as comfortable a high-sided, deep-cockpit mono-hull with baller headroom in its cabin may be, it’s not ideally suited for speed.
Yet thanks in large part to BBLADES Professional Propellers of Princeton, Wis., there’s another Black Thunder laying down impressive speeds these days. Owned by Ryan Ward of Clio, Michigan, and powered by twin supercharged and electronically fuel-injected 1,022-hp engines, the 46-footer that weighs more than 12,000 pounds reportedly has topped 96 mph—and has more in it.
“I’ve still got to find the sweet spot,” said Ward. “It should get close to 100 mph.”
Just fine for old enemies and bad restaurants, “out of sight, out of mind” should never be used to describe the engine compartment of a go-fast boat—that’s the word from Johnny Walker, the chief executive officer of Baja Marine in Washington, N.C. which builds the Baja, Donzi and Fountain sportboat lines. A pristine engine compartment isn’t just eye candy, it’s an important tool for spotting potential problems, according to Walker.
Earlier today an extensive and challenging restoration project was unveiled at TNT Custom Marine in North Miami as an experienced boater—who prefers to remain anonymous—hosted a party to celebrate the re-launch of the 31-foot Bertram raceboat White Tornado.
The White Tornado, a 1966 Betram offshore raceboat, is as good as new thanks to TNT Custom Marine and several other outfits that were involved in the restoration of the 31-footer, which is now powered by twin Mercury Racing 520 engines.
In March this year, we caught up with offshore racer Dan Lawrence of the The Hulk team fame on the restoration of Loan Shark, his 32-foot Doug Wright pleasure catamaran originally built for Super Stock-class competition in 2005. Lawrence ran the then-canopied cat with Marc Granet (long before Granet could even imagine driving for the Unlimited-class Miss GEICO team) and the duo won five races in its first season. Two years later, Lawrence had the cat’s canopy removed and converted it to for pleasure use. Since then, he's used it for poker runs—putting more than 800 hours on the 32-footer—and other recreational go-fast boating events.
Lawrence logged a lot of memories in the cat during the years, but arguably his most noteworthy memory of all came yesterday afternoon when he ran the boat, renamed Martini-Rossi and powered by twin Mercury Racing OptiMax 300XS outboard engines—with 80 operating hours on them—to 122 mph.
After a full season of boating at Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri—and a trip to Florida for the Florida Powerboat Club’s Key West Poker Run in November—Alex and Leslie Fruth of Illinois turned their 46-foot Outerlimits Offshore Powerboats V-bottom over to the talented team at Waves and Wheels in Osage Beach, Mo., for an interior overhaul after the boat returned from Key West. And according to Alex Fruth, who has owned several performance boats including an Outerlimits 42 Legacy, the interior updates Waves and Wheels completed on the 2008 46 Limited he purchased last spring are impressive.
Waves and Wheels in Osage Beach, Mo., handled the interior updates on this 2008 Outerlimits 46 Limited.
With a re-machined rudder (read the story) on his Skater Powerboats 368 catamaran, Gone Again top-speed shootout team owner Kenny Mungle and John Tomlinson of TNT Custom Marine—the Miami outfit that has been handling the re-rigging and setup of the 36-footer—tested before noon today. Their primary goal in today’s test session was to determine if the retooled rudder improved the cat’s high-speed handling.
Kenny Mungle (left) and John Tomlinson headed out this morning for the first test of Mungle's Skater 368 catamaran with its retooled rudder. Photo and video courtesy/copyright Jim Winters/Speedonthewater.com (click image to enlarge, see video below).
While everyone involved in the Gone Again team’s Skater Powerboats 368 catamaran project had hoped that the second round of testing today in Miami would reveal a flawless boat ready for the 2015 top-speed shootout circuit, no one really counted on it. As the cat’s owner Kenny Mungle said in a speedonthewater.com story on the first test earlier today, “There’s no set ‘formula’ for it. So it’s going to take little time.”
Said Lee Lockwood: "It's the first sea trials so we're taking it day by day." Photo courtesy/copyright Jim Winters/Speedonthewater.com (click image to enlarge).
John Tomlinson (right) plans to "rebalance" Kenny Mungle's Skater 368 and test it again tomorrow.
While today’s heavy rain in the Miami area would have forced Gone Again team owner Kenny Mungle to cancel testing his Skater 368 catamaran with John Tomlinson of TNT Custom Marine, the principals agreed—after morning and afternoon sea trials yesterday—to refocus their effort on the 36-footer’s center gravity. The problem at hand is the cat’s tendency to porpoise at speeds up to 150 mph, a significant issue for any high-performance catamaran, much less one that Mungle and his fellow Gone Again teammate Lee Lockwood plan to use in top-speed shootout events this year.
Fans of Kenny Mungle’s Gone Again team's top-speed shootout campaign will have to wait for more than the finalization of his next boat’s name—they’ll have to wait see what his next boat will be. According to Mungle and Ron Szolack, the 36-foot catamaran’s owner, the two reached an agreement today in which Szolack would refund Mungle’s deposit and Szolack would hang on to the one-of-a-kind, all-carbon-fiber cat.
“I told Ron I wasn’t happy with the way the boat was handling, and I asked him for my deposit back,” said Mungle this evening via mobile phone during his drive back to Houston, Texas, with his Gone Again partner Lee Lockwood. “Ron agreed. It was all really friendly. I consider Ron a friend—he’s a great guy.”
The question has been asked of us of at Potter Performance Engines many times: “Should I rebuild my boat’s current engines or just buy new engines?”
The answer? Every situation is different and can only be answered objectively after first disassembling and inspecting the engine in question.
I can’t tell you how many times a customer calls asking for a price on a new engine. My first question is always, “What’s wrong with your existing engine?” Many people think that because an engine is damaged, it’s not worth rebuilding. This is not necessarily the case. In fact the majority of engines coming through our shop over many years were not nearly as bad as the customer had expected.