I got her joined on the outside will blow her out of the mold in the morning and get the hull and deck glassed together on the inside, then the rails will go in and I still need to lay up your hatch witch will be one of the 1st things I do in the morning. I joined her at the same time i did a Thundercat. We use that big thick sheet of glass to make sure the cat is good and straight before we join them, the paper funnel is how we put the putty in the deck and hull seam. I also tape the hull before putting the tape on, I took the tape off before taking these pictures, sorry. when the tape is in place and you wipe the putty out you want to see the black edge of the dec, so you do not have putty dried below the deck line. But in stead get a nice clean finished deck line on a shoe box fit boat.

So the C-54 hull is joined on the inside now. and is ready for the transom and engine rails. The hatch did not turn out right, but Another one is already gel coated and will be laid up today. This lil girl should be on her way to you Monday.

Do you folks have a hull small enough that’s suitable for a 3.5cc inboard? I have a mid 80s Graupner Arrow kit I got from a buddy that someone else built. It runs okay, but it’s not great - looking for something a little more modern that I can (correctly) build. I’m big into helping the small business, so if there is a hull small enough for a .21 glow engine, we might be able to get something going.

Thanks for your time. Your boats look stupid awesome!!!!

Thanks for the update. Take whatever time you need this will be a winter project. After I receive it and have some time to decide on set up I will get with you on a hardware order.
Thanks again
Gary

I have to give some thought to what I might be able to build that a .21 would work good in. I have some small scale hulls that are great for electric build, but would not be good for a tuned pipe and I am also not sure how good they would handle as they are built from plugs for the real boats. Garrace your boat is done when I put the rails in her this morning, I will get her boxed and on her way to you. Thank you again for your order, hope you love your boat. These are 2 of the small I think like 23" or so small hulls we make, 1 is the Hustler from Cigarettes' Boats and the other is a Sea Ray 310. all you get from me is the bare white hulls. for 100.00 they do not have hatches, but the why to do them is make the whole deck the hatch. Garrace, I do not sell hard ware but if you text me 321-514-2780 your number so I have it and will call you back or answer your call, get the information on what you want to do with your C-54, or if you post it right here. I will help you with what I know, and be happy to learn from what you know, but we could do it right here to get Rc groups boat page going again. Just so Everyone knows, If I do not have your number in my phone, I will not answer. I do return calls if a message is left. just to many spam calls these days.

Hull looks great! As far as hardware I was looking on your website and your express drive 2 etc. But maybe it’s old listings.

It is, the web site that is on the internet cloud is around 20 years old. I No longer carry anyWe would give others information on what it takes to out fit a gas boat if you ask questions and I give you answers hardware or sell it, But the good part about that is if you want to pick my brain on it, and I want you to look great at the lake with our hull. I really will tell you what I think is best to do what you want with the hull and it will not be influenced by what I have and want to sell. but simply is the best parts to get where you say you want to be. it will help others thinking about building a gas boat if you ask questions here, and I give you answers . Just people reading our conversation really helps people trying to decide on what hobby to get into.

Excellent! You have opened yourself up to a flood of my questions. LOL. Because of Covid nobody is running any events where I could ask questions or see what people are running. I plan on building the c54 to meet G1 or G-limited rules. With that in mind I will be using a Zenoah G260PUM engine. Everything else I am open to suggestions. Also if you have recommendations for location of engine, strut,rudder etc. Not a big hurry as I don’t have the hull yet but I like to shop while the weather is crappy. Bare in mind I have only done FE boats up until now so all information is greatly appreciated.

Originally Posted by Expresscraft

I have to give some thought to what I might be able to build that a .21 would work good in. I have some small scale hulls that are great for electric build, but would not be good for a tuned pipe and I am also not sure how good they would handle as they are built from plugs for the real boats. Garrace your boat is done when I put the rails in her this morning, I will get her boxed and on her way to you. Thank you again for your order, hope you love your boat. These are 2 of the small I think like 23" or so small hulls we make, 1 is the Hustler from Cigarettes' Boats and the other is a Sea Ray 310. all you get from me is the bare white hulls. for 100.00 they do not have hatches, but the why to do them is make the whole deck the hatch. Garrace, I do not sell hard ware but if you text me 321-514-2780 your number so I have it and will call you back or answer your call, get the information on what you want to do with your C-54, or if you post it right here. I will help you with what I know, and be happy to learn from what you know, but we could do it right here to get Rc groups boat page going again. Just so Everyone knows, If I do not have your number in my phone, I will not answer. I do return calls if a message is left. just to many spam calls these days.

Your hulls look really nice! My Graupner Arrow is 31” long, 8” wide, and 6” deep. The back half of the top is a lid they is velcro/radio box taped in place to access the engine and electronics. I’m just scouting the options for now. I have a modified K&B 3.5 Inboard that’ll be powering the new boat.

My C54 hull just arrived. Looks great! Can’t wait to get started on it .
Thanks again!

Okay now for the questions. Lol. I purchased a zipkits pro v ultimate hardware kit with a long stinger and long rudder standoff. I need mounting locations for all the stern hardware specifically the strut with any offset if that is appropriate for this boat. Also engine location for a zenoah g260 no clutch. Any other build and setup information greatly appreciated. There are probably some build threads out there but my search didn’t really turn up anything useful. This is for my c54.
Thanks

Wow, lots of good reading between the two Expresscraft threads that I've read so far.
Really appreciated the phone call today and talking boats. Looking forward to getting that MTI cat from you.

I've been out of the boat hobby scene for over 10 years but the bug is coming back in a bad way. Already picked up a couple cute little electrics and put in an order for the Gizmo pro modified 30cc Zenoah for the MTI.

I'm also thinking of scratch building some sort of fast air boat for a 50 or 60cc airplane engine I have.

So much for early retirement.

Thanks for all you do and posting all the pictures. Really shows all the work that goes into building these things.