The “Sexiest Man Alive” Visits Mike Green At Maritime Classics And All They Talk About Is Boats?
Fellow Woody Boater and “Sexiest Man Alive” Tommy Holmes has another fun report. Thank the Gods of Mahogany and Varnish for Tommy and his travels! This time Tommy vists fellow Woody Boater Mike Green for some fun flipping a boat and drooling all over a Silver Arrow. Take it away Mr Sexy!
The ice fishing was getting bleak as the temperature was above freezing and my inaugural tickets had not yet arrive when the phone rang and Mike said “hey let’s roll one on Friday”, so I gather my stash and headed North, to Cedar, Mich. home of Maritime Classics. I rounded up a few of my pals under the guise that we were getting “the band back together” and the gig was up.
Mike gripped the straps and away we went.
Upon arrival at Mike Green’s shop the upside down Gar Wood greeted us with work effort begging. After a new bottom, frames and hull sides the 1936 Triple was ready to be rolled. Who sign me up for this?
Easy Peasy
Half way over, the dreaded boat restorer look appeared as the other half was showing us a lot more work effort remains. No problem for the Professionals!
Not to be dismay, the Gar Wood 25 was sitting upright and proud.
Note the pointy end. Nice.
The crew posed for a Presidential congratulatory photo op, only to be out focused by the deck work remaining for the next administration.
Friday rolling party in Cedar on new President’s day; it don’t get better than that! Except when Dick DeBoer said he was buying at the Copemish Bar Friday Night Fish Fry!
Oh La La!
And now Tommy Focused on the Silver Arrow at Maritime!
I am not sure why Chris Craft didn’t name this boat the Silver Bullet, just saying. After you see the boat up close and personal, especially when it’s brand silvery new, they could call it anything e.g. Silver Beauty Arrow/Bullet for all I care. This is one Art Deco imported from Detroit, baby.
It’s beginning to look like the Batmobile.
Yup, that’s Batman and Robin checking it out.
Yes it’s glass on wood, naturally. Cheese on hard salami. Sounds good, taste greats, what could go wrong?
Yup, definitely Batmobile. Some 91 of the Silver Arrow boats were made by Chris Craft. Now more collectible than ever, just ask Rich.
To restore a Silver Arrow, Not so Easy Peasy. Something about spraying gel coat with just the amount of flake and lots of silver, as I understand. Simply stated , it’s like spraying your Corvette only more difficult. Call Mike for precise technique. Notice “Made in America” R. DeBoer was at hand, thank goodness.
Just another boat in the shop, a Red/White Racer type boat getting its sanding. Spray, sand within four hours, sand, sand, and probably sand some more….
The early Racer models were Red/White with special coating. Call Mike for MSDS specs.
“It’s not easy, that’s why we have professionals”, stated Dr. Ballard on the way back to the Lake Ann Brewery. Thanks to Professional Boat Restorer Mike Green, Maritime Classics, a true Silver Arrow, for the visit. Silver Arrow and Red/White Racer. That would be a race!
Great stuff, thanks again
The cool thing about Tommy and his travels is he never has to leave Michigan to keep producing all of these stories. It seems like he lives amongst an endless supply of amazing boats.
We call it “Pure Michigan”!
What? No Century boats? And Tommy still went. Fishing must have been really bad.
Great looking boats!
Perfect story for a hump day.
Wait I didn’t work on Monday and yesterday was a snow/sleet/ice event here, so I guess tomorrow is my hump day.
Nice report, Tommy. I must say when I first read “Sexiest Man Alive”, several names came to mind. Let’s just leave it at that…
Mike Green, your resto’s are beyond spectacular! It’s always nice to see your name “in lights” (or print).
Carla, you have to keep in mind that in Woodyboaterville standards for sexy may be different from those in the outside world, similar to the wey propper spelling is a bit diferent hear.
We dont make this stuff up. Its official, and have yet to find someone more Sexy, the guy just gets better with age!
I could spend hours with Mike Green, he’s such a great resource. I don’t know where he finds time to get all this info and still do the absolute best quality work. “Pure Michigan” is where its at.
Pure Michigan should host an ACBS international one of these days.
It’s happening in 2018 in Port Huron, hosted by the Michigan chapter Check out our web site for details.
I think the Water Wonderland chapter my be the host for the 2019 show.
Michigan has it covered!
M-Fine,
One coming soon! Racine, WI this year then Pure Michigan!! Port Huron in 2018
Water Wonderland Chapter will host the International show in 2020, up in the “Pure Northern Michigan” country at Bay Harbor, Michigan. Your chance to visit Hessel’s on the first day of the Pre events…
Alex doesn’t know it yet, but I plan to show up a week early with a big wet Tobler dog to smell up his place.
So…..Tommy…..how WAS the Copernish Bar Friday Night Fish Fry?
Just in case I’m ever over that way from the Fish Fry Capital State of Wisconsin.
Jack, I think it was Cod, hard to tell for sure. Stroh’s – Pure Michigan – beer helped.
strohs has had nothing to do with Michigan since around 2000 most of it is brewed by Miller. just like johnny Pfeiffer and brewester the rooster part of a bygone era.
Taste great, more Filling. shortS.
Pure Michigan and Classic boats. What a great combination!
Mike
Your boat flipping rig/technique is ingenious. It must be easy-peasy like Tommy said. How do the sling straps move as the boat rolls? Do the boat trailer winches free wheel while you are pulling it over with the chain fall? It looks like two people can flip a boat very easily with this.
Wes, there are rollers that you can’t see behind the 2×8’s that the straps are riding on. We can flip 19′ and smaller boats without the use of the com-along but for the larger heavier boats the winch helps with the hard part of pulling the boat around. The winch’s are heavy duty and lock with that we put a rope looped on the handle just in case.
Looks great, Mike. Keep up the good work!
Mike is just a genuine good guy. Humble. Oh, and a pretty good boat restorer…
It just dawned on me that there are two of Marty Feletto’s old boats in there. Small world.
Maritime Classics home of the mirror finish where the sexiest man alive shows us how they make it look simple. Nice story Thomas and a good place to craft a story with a Photo Op IPA from Lake Ann Brewery. Cheers!
The whole process took about an hour. Thanks for the invite, Tommy. While turning the boat, the black horizontal lines keep the yellow straps from sliding to the pointy end. No one got under the boat, All crew members called out their corner watches. and no foul words were spoken.
The boat was lowered by four men on the post mounted winches onto two castord metal frame cradles.
Mike and crew started the deck at 1 pm by removing the finished sheer planks. At the Water Wonderland President’s Tour this last spring, this boat was upside down with keel frames and chines done. There were two forward garplanks ready to fasten
The Silver Arrow line starts in Traverse City, Michigan as the ‘Lake and Sea’ ChrisCraft bought the line to explore fiberglass construction.
Looking at old boats must be a lot more fun than fixing teeth, but probably doesn’t pay quite as good
Thanks Carla! 😉 Many of the first (’36-’37) Racing Runabouts were sent to Europe and were white with royal blue covering boards and kingplanks, some had yellow hulls as well. That Silver Arrow is stunning!
Brian – I figured the Gar Wood triple was my old boat – which other one?
Lipstick
Mike and I worked together for a couple years and Wednesdays were always his favorite day.
Nice, smoke ’em if you got ’em
Thank’s everyone it was a good day. Whenever you do that much work to a boat it’s always nice to get it turned back over and get your second wind. Thank you to Tommy as well for coming out and writing the story for everyone to enjoy. We will be letting the Gar Wood rest for a bit so we can get some wood working done on some other project and to the staining and varnishing on the 2 barrel backs we have to complete for spring. A couple of minor corrections on the Silver Arrow project. We used a product called Dua-tech which is a very hard product that will make sure that there is very little shrinkage so that finish will look brand new for many years. The boat is hull #66 out of 92 ever made and this one being a later boat came originally with the 283 ci. engine. We will be doing that same process on the Red and White. The way you see it in the photos it is skim coated with Rage filler (which we sand almost completely off)so we can make sure the boat is completely fair before we spray on the Dua-tech on. Thanks to Matt as well for place to showcase our work!!!