New to the power boat world. Decided to jump in head first!

Coming from the world of sailing. I decided to also look into something a little more "spacious" so my work from home days could be enjoyed, from the San Juan islands for a few weeks at a time. Did some research and felt like the timeless look, best amenities and something I could work on/understand (and also afford) was an older Grand Banks.

Found one locally. Went and saw it, and boy was it recently neglected. You could tell at one time the boat was seriously loved though!! It has a story to tell and even though it hadn't even been washed it called to me. The broker selling it didn't even think it would sell.

This 1977 Grand Banks 42 classic that was once loved a lot had been sitting for unfortunately 4-5 years on the hard. The previous owner is in hospice and moved out of state years ago (his wife was never into boating and didn't like it). I Made an offer, did the survey and went in head first knowing I am going to be spending a large chunk of my foreseeable future becoming a pseudo expert on understanding this boat and how to do all the work.

Hopefully other locals in the Pacific Northwest may recognize the boat, and know she lives on to make new memories and earn some frustrating curse words along the way.

Plan on doing a lot of searching previous posts to answer as many questions as I can, and also asking you all a bunch as well.

Here is the video of the boat for those that want to see what I got myself into! (Years of sanding and bright work!)

Broker Video

Welcome and good luck.

Nice.

Go to my blog, grandbankschoices. Lots of GB projects and some 42 classic upgrades.

Leaking teak decks, rotten fuel tanks and ancient electronics (was that a crt radar display?) are several of the potential problems I saw in the video.

Roughly $100 K at yard prices.

Engine room looks ok. What engines? White usually indicates Cats.

David

DavidM said:

Leaking teak decks, rotten fuel tanks and ancient electronics (was that a crt radar display?) are several of the potential problems I saw in the video.

Roughly $100 K at yard prices.

Engine room looks ok. What engines? White usually indicates Cats.

David

Click to expand...

Decks are dirty and in need of a lot of love. Will take that project on myself. Was surprised that just rubbing my finger on one part cleaned off the mud quite nicely. Still needs to be recaulked and gently sanded down im sure though.

You are correct, super old electronics. They all work, and will allow me to spend time/resources on the other projects until they fail. But will need to be updated at some point.

No rotten fuel tanks, in fact they were cleaned in 2018.

Engines are Ford Lehman 120s. No idea why they painted them white? Oil analysis from the engines was good on one, and a slight amount of sodium on the other. My assumption is the pencil anode needed to be changed a long time ago and this probably caused some problems with the oil cooler.

Excited to learn and take on these projects myself!

Head first, indeed. But from the video the boat doesn't look that bad. Some signs of water leaks to deal with. Are the decks solid and dry, or is there rot? You might consider just removing the teak decking, filling all the holes with epoxy, and putting down kiwigrip for non-skid.

The problem with teak decks is not dirt. The teak is screwed into the fiberglass. Those screws loosen and allow water to migrate into the deck core which is balsa and rots the core. Eventually it leaks into the compartment below.

So check the compartments below for leakage from above.

Here is one solution. Pull off all of the teak and then remove the top layer of fiberglass. Dig out the rotten core, replace it with new and then glass over it. This can easily cost $50,000 to have a yard do it.

Those Lehmans are solid engines. Get to know Brian at Americandieselcorp.com. He is the go to guy for advice and Lehman parts.

Surprised all of the ancient electronics still works which is great because as you say, you can upgrade it as time and money allows.

David