TOPIC: 1957 Herters boat

Hello Everyone,

I'm new to the site and now an owner of this 57 Herters Flying Fish project.
I'm sure I can get carried away with this restoration (I hope not haha! ) but, I would appreciate any suggestions, tips, and overall suggestions from you guys.
Here are some pictures, she isn't perfect but, I think it's a good start.
Sadly she is missing the glovebox lid and the cigarette/lighter holder hopefully ill find them one day.

Thank you all!

Andrey

P.S. I'm not sure if the images are showing, let me know if they aren't. Thanks

Hello AxAxA welcome aboard! That is a really cool project you have there,I look forward to seeing you work on it. Your question of tip on restoration is a way to broad of a question. You will have much better luck with answers from the community, if you narrow questions down to seek guidance on something more specific. As a side note I see your boat is registered in Wisconsin, I also live in Wisconsin by Hartford.

Hello and thank you for your response and a tip regarding any help.
Well, so far a couple of things come to mind.
First, is it possible to find someone here, or if someone knows other places to get the glovebox lid from Herters?
Maybe someone makes replicas?

Another question is regarding an engine.
I have a 50 HP Merc on it now and I have no clue about the year of it. I was going to rebuild this one just because it was sitting for a very long time. However, I've noticed that it's a pull start only and I would love to have an electric start.
So I went on a hunt for a starter and other parts for this motor to convert it and ended up picking up another 50 HP Merc of that era +/- but with an electric start in it.
The problem is that this other motor doesn't have the bottom end and so I thought to swap them.
I have both serial numbers from the engines but Mercury isn't much of help because they don't know much about the old engines. They can't even tell me if two are compatible with one another.
Based on my visual inspection both engines look identical, one is a pull start and another is an electric start.
Anyone got some knowledge or could take a look at serial numbers and tell me if it's possible?
I can take any pictures necessary of both engines if needed.

Thank you!

The glove box is probably going to be impossible to replace with an original, if your really lucky you might be able to sweet talk someone who has one to make you a 3D printed one. If it where me I would just make something out of a piece of mahogany, a splash of wood never looks bad on these old boats. The outboard is a 1967 if the decals are correct and haven't been changed for some reason. If you get a mercury selco manual for your motor it will have a list of serial numbers and corresponding years for them to confirm my guess. I see no reason the lower units wouldn't be interchangeable so long as they are the same shaft length. Also that would not be the correct year motor for a that boat, so I wouldn't get to hung up on trying to replicate your existing motor although it looks just fine as it is. Hope that helps.

Oh, that's great, I thought that it was around 67-68. Thank you for that.
I would pay someone to ship me their lid so I can make a copy of it and id ship it right back to them.
I'm assuming the correct engine would be something from the mid to late '50s but would it be Merc or Johnson?

Also, I'm not too hung up on this engine as much, I just really don't want to spend stupid money for anything new or newer, especially in today's market where people ask crazy money for things.
If all does well and this engine will work, ill be happy with it I think for this size and profile of the boat 50HP is pretty good.

The motor could have been any brand that was available when the boat was sold from the dealer. Boats did not come to the dealers prerigged with a motor like they do today. That is a fairly new thing with boat manufacturers. I do have a few mercury motors I have been thinking about selling from the late 50s if you are interested. Do you live in Wisconsin?

I understand.
I'm in Illinois actually but WI is not a far drive
Send me a message let me know what you have and how much, we can go from here