I answered an ad and found this boat. Owner wanted $1600 for boat and tow tubes. I checked out the condition of the floor. It seemed solid. The seller could not get the motor started, and he needed to sell the boat because the house was for sale and he had no where to store it. We settled on $800 and he kept the tow tubes.

I put the boat in the garage and started to inspect what I had bought. This is the first boat I have owned. I found lots of help at iBoats.com.

Started cleaning out the boat. It was covered with stickers and decals from the previous owner and his little brother. It became obvious that they had little mechanical skill as I removed a lot of "jerry-rigged" mainenance.

One of the reasons I bought this boat was because the seats were in great condition. They were just the wrong color for the boat! It also had a newer Teleflex steering unit. It was just installed incorrectly for the motor on the boat.

The gel coat was turning white from years of sun damage. It appears blotchy here and you can see the hand prints in it where ever I touched it.

Here the deteriorated vinyl wood grain covering can be seen on the side fiberglass consoles. These consoles were an upgrade to the Niagara, changing it from a Niagara Deluxe model to the Niagara Custom model. The Custom also included a splashwell and ski racks.

There were holes drilled in the dash, the carpet was shot, and wires hung loose everywhere. And it smelled funny.

There was a 1967 60hp Evinrude V4 on the boat. The steering was not hooked up right and it barely turned the motor. The ignition wire fell off the key in the dash, after connecting it, the big old V4 fired right up. Unfortunatly, this motor needed a bit of work. Water hoses were rotted, all the wiring was cracked and had corrosion and I couldn't find parts for the motor on the net. So I took it off and sold it on E-bay. Got $400 from a guy who just wanted the lower unit.

Winter was coming so I cleaned up, covered the boat with a blue tarp and stored it outside.

The boat came with brand new marine battery, two new 6 gallon gas tanks, way too big anchor, and misc other items.

Spring came and I found out that the trailer was badly bent and in need of a lot of work. The tires were rotted, coupling was bent, the jack had been hack sawed off, the winch was rusted and needed a new cable. So I bought a new 1200lbs GVW galvanized trailer with 12" rims for $450. Sold the old trailer for $100.

Picture shows how the boat was pulled off the old trailer onto the new trailer. The winch post was removed from the old trailer, then the new trailer backed up over it. The winch from the new trailer was connected to the eye bolt and winched the boat onto the new trailer. The 2x4 was used to help nudge the boat up onto the first keel roller. After that it was just cranking.

The saw horse in the boat was made from 1x4 and supported the tarp like a tent so snow and rain would not puddle on the cover during storage.

I wanted the boat to be reliable, safe and easy to maintain. That meant a newer power plant than the old '67 Evinrude I sold. I decided on a rebuilt outboard because they are much less expensive than a new outboard, and you get a warranty and know exactly what you are buying compared to a used outboard off E-bay.

I chose to use a Johnson/Evinrude 40 or 50 hp twin because they have a fabulous reputation, parts are inexpensive, they are plentiful and are the right hp for this boat. A plus is that it weighs about 120lbs less than the 67 evinrude 60hp that came on the boat.

I decided to buy from BlackBird rebuilders. They deal mostly with marinas supplying them with quality rebuilds to re-power trade-in boats that will be re-sold. This motor is a complete rebuild 1993 Evinrude 40hp with new pistons & rings .20 over, new bearings, seals, water pump, sonically cleaned and rebuilt carbs, disassembled and inspected lower unit with new seals, pressure tested, and 1 year warrentee.

Blackbird also supplied the 1970 era control box and cables, as well as a good VRO oil tank. This package is the single most expensive part of this project at about $2400.

Before investing any more time and money into the boat, I decided to just get it rigged and in the water for a test run. We had a blast. Broke in the motor according to the instructions and had no problems.

Realized that the seat height was too high, the windshield is so bad that when the sun hits it you can't see through it! Both issues addressed later. Also needed to fine tune the trim setting and change prop to larger pitch.

The Niagara really looked bad because of the dull gel coat. I tried various things to polish it up, but nothing worked well until I used Comet Cleanser and Scotch Brite pads to scrub off the layer of dead gel coat. This took a bit of effort, but the whole boat was done in one afternoon. This photo shows how there is no reflection in the gel coat prior to scrubbing and polishing.

After scrubbing with Comet and pads a polisher was used with rubbing compound and then with polishing compound to bring back a shine to the gel coat. This photo shows the reflection that the polisher gave to the gel coat. I wrote an article on polishing out the gel coat. You can read it here: http://www.fiberglassics.com/mfg/restoring_glossgelcoat.htm

Boat was stripped of seats, carpet, steering, all wires and hardware. A new wire harness was made from marine grade tinned wire for the running lights and accessories.

I also added tachometer, speedometer and temperature guages before going out on the test run earlier. All that was removed to facilitate the gel coat polishing.

One notable feature of the MFG Niagara is that the floor and stringers are molded from solid fiberglass. This feature saved me countless hours and dollars because the floors did not rot and don't need replacing. The floor is one piece molded fiberglass a beige gel coat m the factory.

Close up photo of the ski rack. The vinyl was difficult to remove, but underneath is this great brushed aluminum extruded piece. It was a pleasant surprise. I decided that it looked so nice I will just leave it bare aluminum.

The consoles were stripped of the wood grain contact paper. New white upholstery vinyl was used to cover the consoles. It was attached with contact cement. More of the ski rack can be seen here.

The hull interior was painted with a pale green speckle paint. I was going to leave it alone and dye the seats blue with blue carpet. I am now glad that my wife suggested white hull, with white seats and grey carpet. As you can see in the final photos, the interior came out super.

The windshield was in poor condition. It had crazing and was discolored from 40 years of exposure to the elements. I bought a piece of polycarbonate 1/8" thick. The old windshield was removed from the frame and a template was cut from poster board. A new windshield was cut using the template. The frame was polished using steel wool, rubbing compound and lastly polishing compound. It really came out shiny. The new windshield was fit it into the old frame and deck gasket. Then it was remounted onto the boat. It came out great.

I wrote an article on the windshield repair part of the project . I did it because so many people need windshields for old boats, but either can't find one or can't afford a replacement. Hopefully my method of repairing the windshield will help others repair theirs. You can read the article as a sub project to this one.

Here is a photo of the boat in August 2004 taken on Long Island NY at a beach on the Peconic Bay.

At this time, the prop was changed to a Hustler 12.5 x 15 and motor trim pin was moved to trim in the motor a bit more. Top speed is 30mph at 5000 rpm. With my wife, 3 kids (14, 5, and 1) and all the gear top speed is 28 and cruises very nicely at 18 - 21 mph.

This photo shows how the interior turned out. New grey indoor/outdoor carpet, seats have had the bases cut down about 4 inches to match the original seats height, the control box was rebuilt and painted, guages installed, new rubrail vinyl insert, deck hardware is painted white with epoxy paint and all systems working.

Some pieces are just not made anymore. Like the 'arrow head' trim end pieces for the rub rail and MFG emblem for the sides. I had one good piece, so I ordered some mold making supplies and tried making some pieces. This photo shows a mold I made from one arrow head, the original arrow head (center) and the new cast arrow head (right). I need to make 4 of these and will be putting them on in the spring of '05.

Finally made a set of rub rail ends for myself. Have made quite a few of these for other folks. If you need a set, drop me a note.

The MFG company emblems were missing from this Niagara all together. Luckily, I was able to get an emblem in fair condition and made a mold from it same as was done above. The finished emblems look really nice. These I painted the shark and wave blue to match deck of boat. If you need a pair, drop me a note.

Finally got around to mounting the rub rail ends. A dab of Boat Life's Boat Seal will ensure the screw does not leak water into the hull. Now I have to polish up that aluminum rub strip!

Picked up this reproduction MFG Pendant. It really is a nice touch.