1969 San Juan has a new home

Well I was at Boston Harbor this morning at 8:30 and was on the road by 9:30. Truck, boat, and trailer made the trip from Boston to Albany without a problem. I will post pics and more info later tonight.
She's gonna be quite the project!

Thats great hope to see it someday. What engine does it have?

Will be keeping an eye on the progress!

Well done....Quite the logistics!   

Looking forward to the pics!

OK, story first and then some pics.
First of all, the previous owner Joe was a great guy. Between him, his son, and the dockmaster, things went pretty smoothly. The boat has been in his family since the early 70s yet it didn't seem like he was too concerned to be "losing" it.
I was going to take my dad's GMC2500 but I took a chance with my truck instead. I have a 2011 Nissan Frontier 6 cyl and it is rated for 5600 lbs towing. This was right at the edge, and my truck is MUCH more comfortable and trustworthy than my dad's. And, I thought it would be nice to have something a bit smaller to navigate the tight streets of Boston. That proved to be a good idea.

I had to back into the gates at the yacht club shown here. It was 8:30 am (rush hour) and I had to back into that gate with cars parked as close as they could be to the driveway. I tried to jacknife back in but it just wasn't working. I detached the trailer and we pushed it in by hand, and then I backed my truck in and hooked back up. It was so tight in there that I thought I'd be scratching cars as I left but everything fit.
It was quite heavy on my truck and unfortunately the boat sat a bit too far forward on the trailer so there was too much tongue weight, but I decided it would be fine.
I stopped at every rest stop along the way on I90 and everything was good. I transferred about 150 lbs from my truck bed to the rear of the boat and that helped as well.

As you can see, the bottom was COVERED in marine life. Things were squirming and very smelly, and they got the ride of their life going 180 miles on the highway.

I had to sacrifice the lives of about a million tiny shrimp and mussels when I got home!

The engine is a 1998 350 EFI. Joe bought had it installed new in 1998 and even gave me the receipt. He also had a new teleflex steering cable that wasn't installed.
The floor was replaced with with plywood; the upholstery is fairly new, and the original color is the hideous maroon that you can see in the 1968 catalog.

The guy in the boat is Joe, the previous owner. The last pic is it connected to my dad's truck; I used his truck to back it into his yard for the weekend.

I'll post pics of the interior and engine tomorrow. It was getting too dark, cold, and windy.

I brought a bunch of tools, 2x4 blocks, 4x4s, 2 jacks, a 20 inch 6x6, and some kneeling pads but I didn't need any of that!

There's a chance that the engine could be OK. It sounds like Joe did a good job of turning it off right when he noticed the oil pressure drop. Hopefully it's just a rusted out oil pan. It is going to be tough for me to lift the engine with this insanely tall boat.

Yes, he gave me the title and signed it over to me as a gift. I hope that is all we need. I'm going to call/stop by DMV on Monday just to make sure I have all the paperwork I need.

Very Cool....Let the fun begin!!!!!

That's a pretty nice find and now you can make some clam cakes and chowder this weekend too.

I've been past that marina a bunch of times. You aren't kidding when you say it is a tight fit backing in there. I wonder how much additonal weight the marine life adds to the boat? I'm curious to find out what happened to the engine. Keep us posted.

I doubt it's closed loop cooling, you'll see right away when you get there, that would be quite a modification on an older boat. Assuming it's not, the question is whether you can flush the engine a bit before you drain it, not sure how to do that without spinning over the engine. With the oil gone, that's not a good idea. You may just have to drain it and stop there.

If it was me, I might try the following. Pull the spark plugs, squirt a bit of light oil in each cylinder, put a wrench on the crank pulley bolt, and see if it easily spins. If it feels smooth turning by hand, I might find a way to hold some oil in the pan, then spin the engine over with the starter while feeding water to the raw water pump intake. This would not only flush out the engine a bit, but would also pump clean oil through so hopefully you get everything coated for the winter. Then you can drain the fresh water for the winter.

Just thinking aloud, curious for comments from others.

By the way, I'm now officially wanting your boat. I always thought I wanted a Cuddy Nautique because of the cabin, but seems like you've got the best of both worlds, cabin plus huge cockpit. I'll give you twice what you paid for it, cash, right now!

Hey Jeff, thanks so much for the update. I too hadn't realized the San Juans had the cuddy. Very slick, and now I REALLY want one once the twins are big enough to get out on the water!

As I said, I'm in and out of ALB all the time. Would love to come take a look sometime. Will you have it inside for the winter?

Looks like it's bottom-painted, so that's good. 3000psi from the pressure washer and you can have a clam bake!

Keep the pics coming when you can. Glad you got the boy out there with ya!

Ultra

Barnical bill called, wants his boat back! cool find.