Chris Craft Craftsmanship

The end of the wood boat

In 1968 they still built them like they used to; plank by plank from the keel up with the hull and interiors hand crafted from the finest Honduran mahogany. The cabinet makers would carefully choose clear grain boards from the vast warehouses stacked with forests of this fine timber.

As they continued to build wood boats at the original Chris Craft boatyard in Algonac Michigan, a new facility was building the "modern" fiberglass models in Pompano Beach Florida. Chris Craft had been building small sports boats in fiberglass for a few years, it wasn't until 1965 that they started to build their biggest boats entirely of fiberglass.

Paramount is "Styled in Fiberglass" and she is hull number two, the second that Chris Craft ever built in this size and the evidence of the transition between wood and fiberglass is found everywhere in her construction. Her helm station and interior are old school "wood boat" - the very next year (1969) Chris Craft went with "no maintenance Arborite - you never have to varnish again" - gone was the solid mahogany.

Restoring the Wood Work

After carefully removing the old varnish with a heat gun, all of the woodwork was sanded back to "new wood" - UV damage was sanded out to reveal the true natural reddish colour of the wood. In keeping with the original 1968 design the mahogany was all stained an even brown colour and 12 coats of varnish are in the process of being applied, with fine sanding between coats to obtain an overall mirror finish.

The large panels of the original veneer in the helm station had to be replaced, due to water damage and previous hardware installations and the resulting screw holes. Westwind Timbers on Vancouver Island were able to find Sapele ribbon grain mahogany - the closest match to the original Honduran.