Pair O' Dice, Tossed - Page 12

This is a 1962 Custom Craft, SunRay. The black and white scans are from the catalog. The Yellow boat shown belongs to Stanley Dohm. These were extremely high styled boats, with radical bottom designs, headlights and Faux tail lights. These were some of the first boats made with the Rand Chop gun, as such, the hulls are weaker than hand laid Fiberglas. It is my opinion that the elaborate contours found in all of the Custom Craft boats, whatever the model, were beneficial in overcoming this weakness.

There are simple ways of strengthening the hull during a restoration using two part foam and Bi-Axial cloth, with a couple of well placed stringers. I have a strong desire to restore this one in that manner to accommodate an aluminum small block Chevy with Hillborn Injection and an inboard/outboard. As crazy as that sounds, I just can't escape the image of eight tall organ pipes, towering over the fins, even with the roof in height!

I would consider the Hardtop option to be a necessity for these boats in order to complete the radical styling, There are only two Hardtop SunRays known. About 3 others have turned up without the top. These are very detailed, heavily sculptured boats.