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dennyjoe2@att.net
09-08-2015, 03:23 PM
Hi - I'm new to the site and was wondering if anyone had info on the Marchetti race boats. I
have one and am in the process of bringing it back to life. Its 10' long

ProHydroRacer
09-09-2015, 07:43 AM
Why?

DeanFHobart
09-09-2015, 08:04 AM
Hi - I'm new to the site and was wondering if anyone had info on the Marchetti race boats. I
have one and am in the process of bringing it back to life. Its 10' long

Hello,

Early 1960's would have a cloth front deck....... Later 1960's would be an all wood deck.

At 10' long, it would most likely would have been a B Stock or C Stock or maybe an A or B Alky boat.

A picture would help.

Best of all, no matter what, I will be a cool restoration project.

All the Best,

Dean Hobart........................................

BILL HOCTOR
09-09-2015, 05:13 PM
Had a 11 ft Mar****ty..Leaked from day 1..Had it back to Nick 4 or 5 times..he said it was worm holes !!!! Ran A & B alky on it

smittythewelder
09-11-2015, 08:30 AM
The O.P. is evidently new to all of this, and we ought to get him clued-in a little bit.

DennyJoe, over the years and decades there were lots of boat-builders, from do-it-yourselfers just building their own hull (often from someone else's plans, sometimes from kits) to those who made their living or part of their living at it. And over the years, at any given time there was usually one, maybe two big names, boat-builders who sold their outboard hydros or runabouts all over the country. In the Thirties and Forties I believe it was Jacoby, in the early Fifties, Neal. By the mid-Fifties, Joe Swift of Florida was turning out hydros on a production-line on a scale unmatched before or since, as far as I know (all of this is subject to correction). From the late-Fifties to mid-Sixties, Sid-Craft in New Jersey was the big name in hydros; they built a lot of runabouts as well but not as many as the long-time runabout king, DeSilva, in California. But the Sids never had their own way, and had to battle it out with the other big name in hydros in the Sixties, Marchetti. Nick Marchetti built the whole range of hydros from A Stock to F Alky, and his boats won plenty of championships. I was a little local-area mid-pack racer in those days, and had a couple of Marchettis for a little while each, a 10' 2'' for BSH and AOH, then a 10' 8" for AOH (what is now more sensibly called 250ccHydro). Both were a little heavy, and I never liked the look of Marchetti's rather low non-trips. But neither boat ever bit me or did anything scary, and I had boats I thought were better that did both!

So DennyJoe, you have a real period-piece there. I'll caution you that like a lot of racing outboard hydros, it's not the kind of playboat that you can bounce over cruiser wakes, and if you try to run over any sort of swell or rollers, you'll soon be contemplating your error. Light flat chop on the lake is what you want, and with that and a light 20-25hp motor and a "speed" prop, you'll have a great time. Best idea is to cartop the boat to a local race (the various organizations post their schedules on this site or www.hydroracer.net ). You'll get lots of info from the old-timers on fixing up the boat, and on engines and props and set-up.

To the old-timers, maybe we ought to have the thread devoted to creating a historical time-line showing what boats, Stock and alky, hydro and runabout, were being used in what years and decades. Not only the big names (am I right in thinking that Krier "owns" the alky runabout classes today in the way DeSilva used to?), but the mostly regional boats (in the Northwest, Karelsen, Ron Jones, Foti, Goff, R&D, and Price-Craft as examples from my day) as well.

rumleyfips
09-11-2015, 11:27 AM
In the late 60's, I was impressed with Dick Summerfield's boat selection. At three different ( maybe even consecutive ) races, he showed up with a C and a D Marchetti, C&D Sids and C&D Castas. He always ran well and the make of boat didn't make much difference.

1100r
09-11-2015, 04:19 PM
Smitty - Very well said and Im sure that is exactly what info he needed. Someone here or Hydro racer as Smitty gave you the link above maybe able to guide you to a person/persons that can help you. He also gave you perfect advice as to conditions to look for to run your boat when your at that stage. Will add always have another boat available to assist you if you need but thats down the road for now Im sure. Good luck on your project and look at the other site and ask there as well.

Smitty - Yes Krier runabouts are probably the most used in alky racing or that style and Derek Gessler makes them as well.

Master Oil Racing Team
09-11-2015, 07:16 PM
If you could post some pictures Dennyjoe2, then the whole power of BRF could come down and nail down, or get close to the Marchetti you own. You've got stock, alky and mod guys here that know what they're looking at. If you have a boat number and or colors.....you may get some really good history on your boat.

Ron Hill
09-13-2015, 09:58 AM
Why?

Aroune 1963, I drove Roy Miner's B Marchetti at Kingburg, California (Fred Hauenstein's home town) we raced around an island. The boat had a tapered cockpit, wide by the steering wheel. I got a good start on the inside and led til the end of the island. I got to the end of the island, no buoys, just island, I climbed forward and turned it like a chine turning runabout. Ted May had got real wide thinking I'd slide out, when he saw what I did, he cranked it hard left and ran on the island and up the bank and he and landed in a tree. I won the heat and the race. Ted came in mad as hell, both of his knee pads were filled with mud. I said, "How come you ran into the island? He just started muttering! I was at Essex, Maryland, Stock Nationals 1967. I was looking to borrow a Sid Craft C or D Hydro as I had been on the road all summer and my Sid was back in California. Nick Marchetti wanted me to try some boat he guaranteed me I'd win D Hydro with it. I checked it out and tried to lift the bow....it weighed more than my whole Sid-Craft. I borrowed Buzz Gotfried's Sid and ....that's another story.

smittythewelder
09-13-2015, 10:40 AM
Several of the big-time hydro builders of the '50s-'70s offered hulls for ASH and BSH, and an in-between size they called an A-B hydro. IIRC, these in-between sized boats were offered by Swift, Sid, Marchetti, maybe Hedlund, and Craig-Craft. And as I remember it, some of the fastest guys in BSH used these smallish boats. Jeff Lowe, who could beat anybody in Reg. 10 and set the competition record, had an A/B Marchetti he'd bought from Mike Jones, who had run it in ASH. A few years later, Jan Christ used a little A/B Craig-Craft to blow past everybody. Both of these guys were also were top-notch drivers. Both were physically a little bigger than the ideal size to be on minimum weight, so maybe that's why they went with the small boats. As for nose-heavy Marchettis, Ed Karelsen was already building hydros with spliced bottoms in his early-'60s ASH boats; the usual 1/4" plywood spliced to a piece of 1/8" plywood forward of the sponsons to keep the front-end light. By the mid-Sixties Ed was doing this with bigger classes. I don't know whether any of the other builders ever did this, but I don't think Marchetti did.

All this is a long way of saying to the O.P. that when you measure your Marchetti, tell us the exact length overall, as well as the length from the back edge of the sponson to the back edge of the bottom, what's called the "afterplane" length . . . roughly five feet for your boat, but give an exact measurement and the old guys who aren't as Altzheimered as me can tell you if your boat is and A, a B, or an A/B.

BRIAN HENDRICK
09-14-2015, 05:51 PM
6024260241
This is a 10'8" Marchettii (10-10"?] I owned for some time and is now back
in NJ near near where it was concieved .
Never raced, 'boys toy', not mine !
No sign of Merc clamps, but sign of KR or SR ?
Cloth deck, so early '60s, 'spaghetti boat ' and few survive.
Maybe a good B popper boat ?

I never did like the later 'scallop deck' C/D hydros,
ie; the transition to pickle forks, although some had sucess with them;

-also a pic of Chuck Simon in this type boat with a converted deflector B Konig
I still have this motor, but never saw this pic before I let go the boat :(

PS; -thanx to Karl W for the CS pic , and other info.
PPS. -that is a SR-39 hex head on the Marchetti, but with copper 4 stud
'Thermo Flow ' aftermarket heads. c1935?

smittythewelder
09-16-2015, 01:06 PM
The smaller boat in the top photo has the tapered cockpit Ron mentioned. In this and many other ways, those first Marchettis were VERY similar to Hal Kelly's "Wetback" design. I'd like to know if Nick got his start with a set of Hal Kelly's plans, then made a couple of mostly cosmetic changes (the cowl, and the contour of the bow) and called it a Marchetti. A lot of builders started by making slight modifications to a popular boat of their day.

dennyjoe2@att.net
09-16-2015, 01:26 PM
Hi - Thanks for the info again. My intentions to buy this guys 10' Marchetti vanished when I saw the "other" Marchetti he had in his garage.
It was a 12 footer made from Brazilian mahogany, front deck was mahogany in pristine condition so I'm getting that this Sat. Will send pic
when I get it.

John Schubert T*A*R*T
09-16-2015, 01:47 PM
The smaller boat in the top photo has the tapered cockpit Ron mentioned. In this and many other ways, those first Marchettis were VERY similar to Hal Kelly's "Wetback" design. I'd like to know if Nick got his start with a set of Hal Kelly's plans, then made a couple of mostly cosmetic changes (the cowl, and the contour of the bow) and called it a Marchetti. A lot of builders started by making slight modifications to a popular boat of their day.
Not true Smitty, he copied the Sid-Craft but made the chines shallower.

smittythewelder
09-17-2015, 06:51 PM
Those flat (25 degree, IIRC) non-trips, and the bottom width (32", again IIRC) are what made me suspect it was a near-copy of a Hal Kelly "Wetback," a couple of which I helped build after building my own "Jupiter." As you know, better than I or most here, the analogous dims for the small Sid hydros were 45 degrees and 34". But I defer to your experience.

John Schubert T*A*R*T
09-18-2015, 05:34 AM
Those flat (25 degree, IIRC) non-trips, and the bottom width (32", again IIRC) are what made me suspect it was a near-copy of a Hal Kelly "Wetback," a couple of which I helped build after building my own "Jupiter." As you know, better than I or most here, the analogous dims for the small Sid hydros were 45 degrees and 34". But I defer to your experience.
Yep, agree that the chine angle & bottom width that you quoted is correct. However, I know for a fact that Nick would never have copied the Wetback as the Sids were always beating Hal. Actually the first boat Nick built for his brother Tony was more like a Sis then his later boats. Insofar as the Wetback is concerned, Hal did a lot of measurements of Sids, bothe runabout & hydro. For example, in 1955 when Sid & Johnny wehrle drove to your area and raced in the nationals, I believe Devils Lake, the best Johnny could do was a 2nd in ASH with his Jacoby, didn't do well in BSH as the guys out there were using pressure regulations that we believed to be illegal, and got trounced in A & B runabout mostly by the CAulkins Crafts. Sid designed the new Hornet when he got back & Johnny took it to Loch Haven over Labor Day. On the way home, the Kelly's, Wehrles & the Schuberts stopped at a diner for dinner. Johnny's dad Wiff suddenly asked "where is Kelly"? Wiff found him outside measuring the Hornet which became his next generation BU. I foret which boat it was as I'm not near his plans which can be found on Skip Hageman's web site where my scrapbook is located. Hal's Airborne was a copy of the Sid "bath-tub". So getting back to the Wetback. Hal never told me this but I'm sure that he incorporated some of the Swift features & measurements when drawing up his Wetback as well as the Sid.
Hope I didn't bore you, but that's history as I recall. it. The Kelly's & Schubert's were good friends. We even traveled together to DePere, WI for the 1954 SO nationals.

smittythewelder
09-18-2015, 08:45 AM
Very interesting, something I always wondered about. So Hal Kelly's A/B "FooLing" and C/D "Madcap," his last and best runabouts, were probably "inspired" by Sid-Craft's very similar runabouts and not the other way around, right? Since I have never know how far back either Sid or Kelly started in boat-building, I guessed wrong. And when you mention the likely Swift influence on Marchetti, that makes sense because the Swifts had those low-angle nontrips. Thank you, John. As a kid, all I had to refer to was a somebody's cast off 1957 issue of Boat Sport (with an article on the new A Konig, an article about Don Baldicini, and a photo of yourself out front in a Sid ASH), and I didn't get into racing myself, with my beautiful but very slow "Jupiter," until 1965 when I was 19, and all of what we're talking about was already old news. By that point, at least in Reg. 10, Kelly's plans-built boats and the Swifts were pretty nearly all gone to the wildcatters, and I never saw even one old step-hydro show up at a race.