TOPIC: 20' 1967 Sabrecraft Sunliner

It was love at first sight. Found her on the side of the road in Grass Valley Ca., 4th of July weekend, 2009. She was in just the most decrepit shape you could imagine, rats nests under the seats, disentigrated duct tape on the torn up upholstery, generations of decomposing leaves and pine needles in every corner. But all the parts were there, the chrome, the awesome old badges. Some of the details were just too good to be true, like the mesmerizing wave texture pressed into the exterior of the fiberglass top, and the textured multi-colored vinyl behind the storage pockets on either side... And she was in good shape mechanically, with less than 1000 hours on the original Chevy straight six. The old farmer who was selling her said he had just changed the oil and sure enough she started right up and purred like a kitten, just sitting there on her custom painted, color matched, pin-striped dual axle trailer.

Sold.

I spent two years bringing her back, truly a labor of love, my first and only boat or boat project to this day. Hours and hours would slip by in the shop, sometimes I would finally look at the clock and realize it was 4 in the morning when I would have guessed it was 10pm. Had the hull reglassed, upholstery redone (took the guy 9 months to find the matching color vinyl) new marine grade astroturf, vacumed and scrubbed and polished every square centimeter inside and out with a fine tooth comb, stem to stern I think they say.

I was going to replace the wood-grain trim strips along each side of the interior with real wood, sanded and stained, but after some consideration realized that the fact that how it was done originally - wood grain vinyl wrapped around and stapled to thin plywood strips (which had both long since disentegrated) was exactly how she wanted to stay... So I ever so gingerly removed and restored the original vinyl, cut new wood the exact same size, and re-wrapped and re-stapled it, to keep that crazy, unbridled mid-century optimism as fully intact as possible. Topped her off with a custom-made color matched cover and I swear she is without a doubt one of the prettiest things I have ever seen in my life, and I have never seen another one like her, not in person, not in pictures, not online - nowhere never.

She has been garaged with the cover on ever since, and now, sadly, the time has come for us to part ways... I hear her calling me, and I think she is saying she wants to see the sun once again.

I wanted to share her with you all before she moves on, since I am sure you will be able appreciate her rarity and restoration, but also, I am seeking your collective wisdom, as have no idea what she might be worth. I am not a boat guy per-se - this one was simply the result of a made-in-the-stars crossing of paths and an extremely passionate, albeit short lived, love affair.

Looking forward to see what the experts have to say, thanks in advance for your time!

I tried to post to the gallery so I could add more than one pic... No luck... the link "post to gallery" that I found in the 'my profile' section seems to do exactly nothing on two different browsers...

Came with this BBQ and mount - Stock equipment...

In the shop

Man, that is a really sweet looking boat.

Gorgeous rig!